John Textor issues statement as Crystal Palace’s Europa League fate hangs in the balance

Crystal Palace’s wait to hear if they can play in this season’s Europa League drags on as owner at centre of issue speaks out about ‘direct influence’ at club

John Textor has reiterated that he never held direct influence over Crystal Palace as the FA Cup winners’ wait to hear if they can play in Europe drags on. UEFA are set to inform Palace imminently if they are cleared to compete in the Europa League alongside Lyon, the French club majority owned by Textor.

And the Eagles’ minority shareholder has insisted that he has proof that he has never made “management decisions” at Selhurst Park while denying any say in appointing Oliver Glasner as head coach.

Palace’s Europa spot is in doubt because Textor did not place his stake in a temporary trust by UEFA’s March deadline.

“Why should I put my interest in a trust back before March when the rule says you only have to do it if you have decisive influence? I don’t,” he told talkSPORT on Thursday.

“If I had a decisive influence, then those Brazilian players that just beat PSG in the Club World Cup, half of them would be coming to Crystal Palace next year.

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“But you don’t see one single player from our network of clubs that’s made its way onto the Palace roster, which is the source of my frustration with the lack of collaboration that we’ve been able to have with Crystal Palace. I am dumb enough and successful enough to not predict in advance what a governing body is going to say.”

Asked to describe his influence at Palace, Textor added: “I helped. I helped a lot. I showed up during Covid. I paid off the Covid debt. I helped finish the academy. The capital, I’m sitting there on the board with four other guys.

“[Chairman Steve] Parish is making decisions. He’s bringing us players. He involves us, but he doesn’t really listen to us. He does, but a suggestion from time to time is not the same as decisive influence.”

Textor also dismissed reports that he was key to bringing in Glasner last year. He added: “I tried to hire him in Lyon. And if [former Palace sporting director] Dougie Freedman notices and he goes to visit him in Salzburg just the way I did and he ends up at Crystal Palace, is there a connection there? I don’t know. Steve’s not going to be told who to hire as a coach,” he said.

“It’s incredibly untrue. We sat in front of the Uefa panel and were extremely consistent on the lack of decisive influence. I don’t even know if I suggested him to Dougie but Dougie recruited him.”

If Palace are blocked from the Europa League they could drop down to the Conference League.

But that is complicated by Brondby, who are owned by another of Palace’s minority owners David Blitzer, already qualifying for that competition via the Danish league. And that ranking takes precedence over teams who qualify by winning a domestic cup competition.

In the event that Palace are denied entry to both competitions their bitter rivals Brighton may find themselves in the Conference League on account of finishing ninth in last season’s Premier League with Nottingham Forest promoted to the Europa.

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