José Campaña’s brilliant free kick, redirected so subtly by Dwight Gayle's headed flick, capped off a shock 1-0 win for the Eagles on Saturday at Liverpool.

It was a positive game against a surprisingly lackadaisical Liverpool side who barely threatened except for Daniele Sturridge smacking the post toward the end.

Well that would sort of sum it up, but sadly the age-old footballing cliché that it's a "game of two halves" proved true again at Anfield.

Of course we looked better for that second 45 - Liverpool basically took a lengthy feet-up, kettle-on, cigar-smoking breather with the job well and truly already done.

To list any genuine positives from our recent games would see me confined to a padded-cell for my delusion, and rightly so.

Having said that, Campaña looked desperate to be involved and always attempting to pass and move. Unfortunately, the lack of similar movement from nearly everybody else kept leading the Spaniard into Liverpool-filled cul-de-sacs.

However, his probing forward passing was a sight for sore eyes, as he constantly looked to play in Gayle or a winger with optimistic, defence-testing balls.

Plus it was nice to see Yannick Bolasie back on and making defenders nervous, and good for the team to score that headed goal.

But the fact MOTD showed about two highlights from the second half says it all. Our improved efforts were too little too late - which I hope isn't a phrase that applies to Palace's campaign at the end of the season.

Liverpool honestly could've been six up at the break had Victor Moses not shown some south London loyalty with a few convincing near misses, while the rest of his side barely accelerated into second gear.

"Counter-attacking" might be an easy description for our tactical setup, and a good idea, but that relies on some sort of defensive base to launch from (and rely on). Instead, our forward pushes left Croydon-sized holes at the back.

To be blunt, no matter how we looked toward the end of the game, when you can barely patch together an hour-long compilation of decent football from Palace over the past four games you know it's not a good sign.

Yes, that includes four very strong sides in Manchester United, Swansea, Southampton and Liverpool, but the ineptitude has been severely disheartening to say the least. 

The last international break, after the Sunderland win, came at a momentum-halting moment and left us with even more injuries.

It's fair to say this time round that everyone's praying the two-week interval stops the rot, leaves our international players unscathed, and provides ample preparation for our must-win Monday night home game against Fulham.

It'd be nice to have a more solidly drilled defence and a more sensible and logical formation – suited to the opponents, not seemingly picked for the sake of it. Or even a settled starting lineup (for the love of God put Gayle centrally up top and start Campaña!), but I'm not getting my hopes up. That really would be delusional.