Ipswich had not won a Premier League game after conceding first since 2001, and Flemming ended that in the 90th minute

The last time Ipswich Town went behind in a Premier League match and still won it, Zian Flemming was three years old. That run ended at Selhurst Park on Saturday evening, in the 90th minute, with Flemming himself bundling in a rebound off the crossbar to beat ten-man Crystal Palace 3-2.

Sky Sports put the streak at 32 Premier League games without a win after conceding first, going back to December 2001. Ipswich have not been in the division for most of the years in between, which is part of the explanation and none of the comfort.

Palace led, and then Disasi went

Palace had won their previous match and started like a side that fancied a second. Daichi Kamada squared it on 14 minutes, Anan Khalaili took a touch and hit it early, and the shot flicked off Leif Davis on the way past Kjell Scherpen. Jorgen Strand Larsen nearly had a second four minutes later, the volley beaten out and the follow-up blocked.

Then came the two moments Pierre Sage will be replaying. On 23 minutes Davis crossed from the left and Palace stopped, apparently certain the flag was up. It was not, and Emersonn headed in without a defender near him. Eleven minutes later Axel Disasi caught Jack Clarke on the shin with his studs and the referee did not need long: straight red, half an hour gone, Palace down to ten for the rest of the afternoon.

Sage reorganised into a back five with one up front, and on the stroke of half-time it cost him again. Davis, who had already made one goal, got a free header on the end of a cross and put it past Walter Benitez, deputising for the injured Dean Henderson. Two goals, both headers, neither of them contested.

Twenty minutes when Selhurst Park believed

Ten men or not, Palace pushed from around the 70th minute and for a while it worked. Quinten Timber had two invitations to equalise and took neither. Then Kamada found Strand Larsen, who leaned on Issa Diop long enough to get the shot away and drilled it low into the bottom-left corner. Selhurst Park was loud in the way that only a ground watching a short-handed side claw something back can be.

What Ipswich did next is the bit Gary O’Neil will keep. They did not chase it. They sat in the game, kept the ball when they had it, and waited. Five minutes after the equaliser Davis looped a header onto the crossbar, Flemming got there first on the rebound, and Ipswich had their first away win in the Premier League since April 2025.

“It wasn’t perfect, but we won,” O’Neil said. “We found a way to win, we deserved to win as well.” He also spent a chunk of his post-match talking about Emersonn, the striker whose header and assist set up the whole afternoon. “I’d hate to play against him,” O’Neil said, which is roughly what every centre-back in the division is about to find out.

Sage: ‘really frustrated’

Sage, who took the Palace job this summer after Oliver Glasner left, was not pretending otherwise. He pointed at Ipswich scoring with their first chance of the game, at the reshuffle the red card forced on him, and at a tactical error just before the break. “I’m really frustrated for the players because they gave a lot on the pitch and they don’t have the result for their efforts,” he said.

He was also asked about leaving Jaydee Canvot out, and did not dress that up either. A sporting decision, he said, based on the Fulham game and the week that followed, and he wants a reaction from Monday. It is not the language of a manager who thinks everything is fine.

Palace sit 16th on three points from four, with a European campaign to fit around it. Sage inherited a good squad and has had a hard opening month. Neither of those facts shows up in the table.

Hull have the headlines, Ipswich have six points

Ipswich are eighth with six, which is two wins from four matches. When they came up in 2024-25 it took them 16 games to get two wins. They beat Sunderland on the opening day this time, led at Old Trafford before Manchester United ran away with it 5-2, and out-created Liverpool on expected goals in a 2-0 defeat. Two of their four games have gone by with them conceding under 0.70 xG.

Most of the noise about the promoted sides has gone to Hull, who are third, and on the evidence so far that is fair. But Ipswich’s start is the more interesting one, because the last time they came up they went straight back down, and this version is defending like a side that intends to stay. Everton are next. That week will tell us plenty.

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