Roy Hodgson has defended his decision to bring on Michael Olise during Crystal Palace’s 4-1 defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion.
Olise, 22, was a doubt heading into the game at Amex Stadium after being forced off with injury during his side’s 3-2 victory over Sheffield United on Tuesday.
On Saturday afternoon, with his side 3-0 down, the winger came off the bench to replace Jeffrey Schlupp at half-time, only to re-aggravate an injury and be replaced by Matheus Franca just 11 minutes later. He walked straight down the tunnel.
Hodgson said after the game that he had been cleared to use Olise if he wanted to, saying: "I was told he couldn’t start the game and everyone was quite comfortable with that. They (medical staff) told me and he told me he was fine to be on the bench and play in the second half.
"Unfortunately because I don’t have a crystal ball, I have no hindsight, I wasn’t to know that was to lead to him getting a recurrence of his injury, that’s exactly what we did. It’s the same with the hindsight that says you’re losing 3-0 why put one of your better players on.
"The answer to that is we brought him all the way here to be on the bench to play in the second half and we wanted our better players on the field. It’s not easy when you've got a player of his quality able to play to just say ‘oh by the way, I know we’ve brought you all the way here to play, I’ve changed my mind, you’ll just have to sit on the bench and watch it'."
