Crystal Palace beat Wolves 3-1 in their FA Cup 4th Round replay to earn themselves a home tie against Aston Villa in the 5th Round. The tie will be played at Selhurst Park on Sunday 14th February – sounds like an ideal romantic day out to me!!

I was rooting for Crystal Palace to make it through the tie for a few reasons. Firstly, no disrespect to them, but I think they’ll be the easier opponent, not least because Wolves would have provided the derby element. Of course we need to avoid complacency and Palace are more than capable of tripping us up, but all things being equal we ought to be able to ease past them.

Secondly, given their current financial problems, it’s obviously a massive deal for them to survive for another round in the FA Cup. It doesn’t hurt having a Premiership team coming to their place either. So if we can play some small part in helping the finances of a great old club like Palace, then that’s also got to be a good thing.

And lastly, Palace were on my side of the pond on a mini-tour last summer and stopped by to play the Harrisburg City Islanders. Palace were great ambassadors for the game, entertained the crowd with some decent football and hung out on the pitch after the final whistle to sign autographs for the kids.

They also endured what is probably one of the most surreal moments of my life and an event which has to be chalked up as one of those things that only happen in America. The team’s were lined up on the baseball field for the national anthems when the local baseball team’s mascot, Cylo the cow [that’s him on the left], made one of the most over the top entrances any mascot could possibly make.

Obviously I displayed faux disgust at my National Anthem being disrespected in such a shoddy fashion, it was basically hilarious, but I couldn’t help wondering what the Americans would think if this were in England and a bovine muppet had landed in a helicopter during the Star Spangled Banner.

What, you don’t believe me? OK, well what’s this then?

I guess they didn’t have a Union Flag, but they did have a nice animated graphic to put up on the big screen. Nice touch I’m sure you’ll agree.

A bunch of Palace fans back in England were following me on Twitter as I did my best to send updates and pictures. It was a lot of fun, but quite tricky to provide a commentary on the tiny iPhone keyboard and keep up with the game. I was expecting to see a lot of Tweets coming out of football grounds this season, but having tried it myself I can see why we haven’t seen as much as I thought we would.

Anyway, Palace did a great job and it was fantastic to see some English football for a change, something I was extremely grateful for. The Palace fans told me about a young player who they considered their crown jewels. I don’t recall his name, but given recent events I’d have to assume that it was Victor Moses. I do remember that he only played the first half and didn’t stand out for me. Fred Sears, on loan from West Ham, was their definitely best player on the night.

One player who did catch my eye was a young South African playing for the Islanders called Ty Shipalane who went on loan to DC United soon after and was later signed permanently. That hasn’t got anything to do with our game of course, but I just wanted to get my scouting skills on record should MON be looking for a new member of staff on this side of the water. Just saying.

So this is a game I’m definitely looking forward to and I think I’m right in saying that this game has been selected for live TV in the UK so even better; I may even get to see it. And as much as I hoped Palace would have a good season, their FA Cup dream has to come to an end on Valentines Day. Sorry Palace, it has to be that way, although I do hope it’s not going to be a massacre. (You see what I did there?).