December 3 2003

The Carling Cup

Crystal Palace crash out of the Carling Cup with a 3-0 defeat at Aston Villa.

Villa started the game off brightly and had a host of chances to score - both Juan Pablo Angel and Darius Vassell tested Cedric Berthelin in the Eagles goal.

Then Stefan Moore and Dion Dublin shot wide, while Gareth Barry, Vassell and Moore had further efforts to open the scoring.

But the hosts did break the deadlock after 22 minutes. Angel struck a long-range shot from the edge of the box and looked like it was going wide, until it hit the head of Kit Symons and looped into his own net past the helpless Berthelin.

Villa were rampant and went looking for a second as Thomas Hitzlsperger went close and Palace couldn't get out of their own half.

Then Tommy Black missed an easy opportunity to level the scores. He somehow missed the target from only a few yards out after Thomas Sorensen parried Dougie Freedman's header to his feet.

Michael Hughes later forced Sorensen into a good save while down the other end, Berthelin did well to save a 30-yard strike from Hitzlsperger.

But Villa doubled their lead on 70 minutes when Angel set up Gavin McCann to head past Berthelin.

And nine minutes later, Angel got the third goal when he slotted home Hitzlsperger's cross.

Aston Villa: Sorensen, De la Cruz, Mellberg, Dublin, Samuel, Stefan Moore, McCann, Hitzlsperger, Barry, Angel, Vassell.

Subs: Hendrie, Postma, Allback, Whittingham, Ridgewell.

Crystal Palace: Berthelin, Fleming, Symons, Popovic, Borrowdale, Butterfield, Derry, Hughes, Black, Shipperley, Freedman.

Subs: Granville, Watson, Riihilahti, Routledge, Myhre.

In Depth Carling Cup 2003/04

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