Dougie Style - The Crystal Palace Departure That Hurt Their Season the Most... And It's Not Eberechi Eze

Palace's Biggest Loss

Going into this season, Crystal Palace fans had every reason and then some to be optimistic ahead of a first-ever European campaign and on the back of their first-ever major trophy, winning the FA Cup at the expense of Manchester City last term.

They've followed in extremely well on this promise as well. Although, their Premier League fortunes haven't been too brilliant, sitting just seven points above the drop zone with nine points left to play for (though any real relegation worries aren't really in the picture) and boardroom and hierarchal drama dominating their season with the pending exit of the hugely-popular Oliver Glasner, their expulsion from their earned spot in the Europa League and settlement for a Conference League spot, to the benefit of Nottingham Forest, and all of the drama surrounding Jean-Philippe Mateta's failed exit from the club in January.

🚨🇸🇦 Dougie Freedman leaves Director role at Crystal Palace after excellent work in the recent years to start new chapter in Saudi Pro League.

Freedman will sign in as new Al-Diriyah director soon, in second division — as @JacobsBen reports. pic.twitter.com/9dcO1zqdbZ

— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) March 18, 2025

Regardless of that, the priority for the Eagles all season long has been their exploits in the aforementioned Europa Conference League. After a thrilling 3-1 win over Shakhtar Donetsk in the first leg of their semi-final last week, Crystal Palace have one foot in a final that will see them square off with either Rayo Vallecano of Spain or French side RC Strasbourg for a shot at major European glory for the first time in their history.

All of this, mind you, has been done with two massive departures leaving voids in their club structure. Eberechi Eze, the talisman of the team who delivered that famous FA Cup win last season, left in a mega-money move to champions-elect Arsenal in the summer, and outstanding centre-back Marc Guehi left for Manchester City with just six months remaining on his deal.

Both departures left huge vacancies within the Eagles' playing staff, but there was another summer departure from the club that, when looking at their post-departure transfer dealings, spells a far bigger and a far more troublesome exit than any other Palace have faced this term.

Dougie Freedman's Palace Departure

One of the biggest figures who can be given the accolade of delivering this wonderful era for Crystal Palace is popular sporting director Dougie Freedman.

The Scotsman returned to Selhurst Park in the summer of 2017, having briefly managed the club earlier in the decade and having played (very well) for them back in the 90's. His arrival came after spells in charge of Bolton Wanderers and Nottingham Forest as well, and signalled a shift away from the dugout and into the boardroom for Dougie.

Matt Hobbs Wolves target, USG player, CAA Stellar player, rotate.#CPFC https://t.co/snesApGSNN

— The Palace Way (@ThePalaceWay) February 2, 2026

What followed for the Glasgow-born former striker was an excellent track record of low-cost signings having huge impacts both on the field and on the balance sheet.

In his time as sporting director, Freedman had plenty of fantastic signings to make a claim of credit to. His move for Conor Gallagher on loan from Chelsea helped springboard the career of the now Tottenham and England midfielder, but it was the groundwork of his permanent signings that left him highly-credited for the London-based side.

The very core of Crystal Palace's side, one now inches away from achieving remarkable European success, was built from Freedman's attention to data both fiscal and footballing. Adam Wharton is the current choice arrival, being brought in from Blackburn Rovers for around £18m before the bigger clubs in the league became aware of his special range of talents. Since then, he became a huge part of the side that won the FA Cup, started and assisted at the start of the season as they won the Community Shield, has helped guide Palace a stones throw away from a European final and, personally, became a multi-time England international and may well be heading to the World Cup in the summer.

But Wharton isn't the only positive arrow in Freedman's quiver. He organised the executed the signings of Maxence Lacroix, Chris Richards, Mateta, Ismaila Sarr and Daniel Munoz who all pay huge roles in their modern-day fortunes. On top of that, he was also the driving force behind the low-cost arrivals of Guehi, Eze and Michael Olise, three paramount talents who have made the jump up to Champions League-level clubs over the past couple of seasons, with Olise in particular now heralded amongst the very best players in the world.

And, on top of all of that, he was the pinnacle figure behind the appointment of Oliver Glasner, who has delivered such remarkable success to Crystal Palace recently.

Matt Hobbs is a big concern to me. His record at Wolves wasn’t great, not done much here either.

— 🇮🇪 Dave 🦅 (@Dave_P_Bailey) May 4, 2026

All of the stated players above carry mainstream qualities that we are all well aware of by now, but most of them were veritable unknowns before they came to South London. All of them arrived for fairly unsuspecting transfer fees and now carry much larger market values. Olise, Guehi and Eze were all cashed in on too, with almost £100m worth of pure profit arriving after their sales to Bayern Munich, Manchester City and Arsenal respectively. Where Guehi is concerned, his sale could have brought this figure miles above this particular mark, but for a £70m bidding war from Liverpool being rejected only for the Englishman to join Man City for a cut-price later on.

A £20m investment in their entire training and academy structure helped shape these young talents into remarkable players with huge upsale value. Aaron Wan-Bissaka came through this revamped system from the age of 11 and made Palace a pure £50m in profit upon his sale to Manchester United in 2019, adding yet more financial backing to a club not owned by the commonly-seen celebrities and billionaires of the modern footballing landscape.

Of course, not every move by Freedman has been an absolute success. Signings like Eddie Nketiah and Matheus Franca have not quite had the same level of success, nor did Patrick Vieira when appointed directly by Dougie in the dugout. However, he has left Crystal Palace in a much better state, both in matters fiscal and football, than the one he joined them in.

And that leads us to the early warning signs that have been sent to Palace fans by his replacement...

Matt Hobbs: The Warning Shot

Now, it must be said that Dougie Freedman was indeed capable of signing some underwhelming players when handed a large chunk of change to work with. His more incisive exploits at the helm of the transfer strategy came when working with the shrewder signings, the players with solid qualities that fit a certain role in a certain system, but none quite on the radar of the biggest of clubs just yet.

Alex Sorloth didn't quite seem able to play football, although his move to Spain changed that and then some in his post-Palace days, and Odsonne Edouard is another player who joins the likes of Franca and Nketiah as not quite having the impact that their £10m+ arrival promised.

But the thing is, under Freedman, Crystal Palace never operated with mega amounts of money. Their rivals, Brighton, are heralded for their buy-low, sell-high approach to signings but the Eagles operate under the same wavelength.

Dougie Freedman signed:

- Mateta for £9m
- Lacroix for £14m
- Sarr for £12m
- Wharton for £18m
- Munoz for £6m
- Richards for £9m

So far, Matt Hobbs has signed:

- Pino for £26m
- Sosa for £3m
- Johnson for £35m
- Strand Larsen for £48m

— ᴮᶦˡˡ (@Billy_Meyers98) May 3, 2026

So, in the wake of Freedman's departure came Matt Hobbs, the man most well-known for his time spent with Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Wolves fans seem to be complimentary of Hobbs during his spell in the West Midlands, and credit the man for adding a much-needed structure to side that had wasted money on the likes of Fabio Silva and Goncalo Guedes for £30m+, whilst failing to retain Vitinha and holding no succession plan for Raul Jimenez. On the other hand, many others also criticise Hobbs as being a key factor behind some nightmare transfer windows for the club that have left them relegated to the Championship for next season. However, his early start at Palace has left a few fans worried about the sudden shift in attitude when it comes to their spending.

In the few months that he has been in-post in South London, Hobbs has executed over £100m worth of signings already, all but wiping out all of the profit made by the club on Eze, Guehi and Olise in recent years. The players that came into that gap amidst that spend? Well, one of them is Brennan Johnson who has gone down like a sh*t in a bath since his £35m move from Tottenham in January, and another pair would be Jorgen Strand Larsen and Yeremy Pino - not bad players, per se, but a duo that has cost the club £74m alone.

Bear in mind, Larsen was leading the line at Wolves to very little effect at the time but is now Palace's all-time record signing. He has scored four league goals since. Furthermore, Hobbs' willingness to throw outrageous cash at a player from his immediately-previous club suggests a lack of a willingness to explore options outside of his immediate comfort zone - whenever that happens to be the case in football, it never ends well.

Crystal Palace will finish the season with potential European silverware in hand, despite a poor Premier League season, to make it three trophies from two campaigns, but they will enter the next one with no Glasner, no Guehi, no Eze and no Freedman, the man who tied all of those pieces of the puzzle together as one.

With a shift in attitude when it comes to fiscal responsibility apparently in the air, will Crystal Palace be in trouble for the long-term if they carry on with their new dynamic?