Crystal Palace (H) | Schumacher's Reaction

Steven Schumacher’s Argyle are out of the Carabao Cup after a 4-2 home defeat to Crystal Palace, and the Greens’ boss says he and his squad will have learned lessons from how the evening panned out.

On the most positive side of things, by the 55-minute mark, Argyle were 2-0 up and seriously good value for their lead. Ben Waine scored inside seven minutes, and Luke Cundle’s pearler made it two within a minute of the second half’s restart.

However, the Crystal Palace manager, their former England boss Roy Hodgson, was able to dig deep into his bench, and introduced Jordan Ayew, Ebereche Eze and Jeffrey Schlupp.

Internationals all, the three men turned the game on its head. Schlupp and Ayew have 110 caps for Ghana between them, and it was the former who laid on Odsonne Edouard to get a goal back.

Eze – one cap for England, but surely destined for many more – then set up Jean-Phillipe Mateta to equalise, and then shortly after to put Palace in front, all in the space of five minutes. By the time Mateta scored his hat-trick goal late on, the wind was in their sails, having been wrenched away from Argyle.

A conversation that took place between Schumacher and Hodgson before the game had started rather foreshadowed what may be about to come.

“Roy spoke to us before the game,” Schumacher said, “about how one time, when he was at Liverpool, he went to a team and he didn't have enough seniors on the bench to change the game when it wasn't going well for them.

“He's obviously learned from that and he's thrown his top players on against us because he could see we were value for our lead, and we looked like we were only the team who are going to go and win it at that time.

“Unfortunately for us, we just felt we didn't do as well as we had been doing and what's got us to that point. We just came off it for five minutes, and once you do that against that quality of player, then you're in trouble.

“Roy came in and spoke to us with Trevor East before the game and I had a good chat with him. Just going up against him on the sideline was a brilliant experience and also a reminder of there's a long way to go for me.

“I've obviously got to try to get better and figure out ways to win games. I think the way our team are playing at the moment is really good, but we haven't won enough games or taken enough points. The last two league games have been gut wrenching to lose in the way we have.

“But we're not far away, I don't think, from being a really good team. Everyone's just got to stick together, keep believing in what we're doing, and learn from these types of nights.”

What Schumacher will have learned – or, rather, had belief reinforced – is that his squad has some serious talent of its own. It says a lot that Hodgson had to thrown on his stars that he may have wished to save, because Argyle were so dominant. A near-full Home Park purred at some of the slick football on display, and it was coming from the brand-new Sky Bet Championship side, not the team from the middle of the Premier League.

Yes, Palace made seven changes to their starting line-up, but Argyle made nine, and various players who have seen their starting minutes limited so far this season took the opportunity to show what they are worth.

The manner of the defeat, especially following injury-time heartbreakers against Southampton and Birmingham City in recent weeks, will not sit ideally with Schumacher, but the first hour of the game, in particular, will surely give him a fillip as Argyle prepare to meet Blackburn Rovers at home on Saturday.

Schumacher said: “I have mixed emotions because I wanted to get through this game. I wanted to put on a good performance. I wanted to pit my wits against a legend like Roy Hodgson. I felt we did that. We did really well but, ultimately, we've lost the game and that's never good.

“We’re obviously not happy to be out of the cup. It's another game that we feel we've played really well in. I’m pleased with what we've done, it was just for a five-minute spell in the second half, where their quality players have turned up and produced moments, and we've lost concentration and got punished.

“The three substitutes that they bring on were Ayew, Schlupp and Eze – and, wow, what a player he's going to be.

“I think their three subs made them realise that we were a better team and deservedly 2-0 up. I just felt if we could have maintained that initial five minutes after they made their substitutes, if we could have still carried on doing what we were doing and not let them get gain that momentum, we would have been alright.

“It was three moments quality from them, three little bits of a lack of concentration from us, and we get punished by a top team.

“Everybody in this squad is capable of playing. That's what we recruit them for. We can't have a starting 11, and then ‘the rest’. We just we can't afford to do that.

“At the end of the game, I said to the lads ‘well done’. Everyone who played is going to give me a few selection headaches for the weekend.

“Yes, I’m disappointed to be out of the cup, but there's another more important game on Saturday now.”