Timo Harvey

Crystal Palace ⚽️

Helsinki/London/Southeast Asia. Hodl #Bitcoin

[Timo Harvey @TimoHarvey]

@salmi_pekka Nimestä päätellen latvialainen.

[Football on TNT Sports @footballontnt]

Crystal Palace fans waited 119 years to win their first trophy... now they've lifted three in the space of a year 🦅🏆

[HLTCO @HLTCO]

My love for Crystal Palace was passed down to me by my Dad, who in turn had been made into a Palace fan by his old man.

From the very beginning, it was stressed to me that following our football club was not about glory or trophies, it was about supporting your local team, having pride in South London when so many at my school chose to support clubs from further afield because they won things, celebrating those triumphs through their TV screens rather than with their own two eyes.

I’ve had a season ticket at Palace for 24 years now, have done just under 650 games, been to 46 different grounds and seen us get hammered by the likes of Scunthorpe and Crewe to name just a couple. I wouldn’t change a single second of it but this last year has been completely surreal.

To see my team lift an FA Cup at Wembley was something I couldn’t quite my head around, generations before me had lived and died, my Grandad included without ever witnessing a major trophy win, the subsequent European tour has been the stuff of dreams.

Last night in Leipzig, I broke down in genuine floods of tears at full-time, not because it necessarily meant “more” than last season’s FA Cup but because I simply never comprehended Palace playing in Europe, let alone winning a trophy at our first attempt.

My little boy is now following in my footsteps with his love for the club and he gets to grow up in a time when Palace are multiple trophy winners, it’s a quantum leap away from where I was at 7 years old and I love the fact that he can go to school and genuinely stand with his chest puffed out because of the club’s achievements.

I’ll stop waffling bollocks now; I’m just so, so happy. ❤️

[Steve Parish @CEO4TAG]

Champions of Europe !

🦅❤️💙🦅

Congratulations to Oliver, to the staff, as well of course the players .

Huge thank you to the fans for the incredible support, the town has been a carnival and the stadium was simply electric - You are the best .🦅

[Sky Sports News @SkySportsNews]

"I was at a protest at Lloyds 16 years ago to save our football club... To be where we are now, I can't explain it."

An emotional Crystal Palace fan reacts to the Eagles winning their first European trophy 🫶

[UEFA Conference League @Conf_League]

European history for Crystal Palace 🏆

#UECLfinal

[UEFA Conference League @Conf_League]

The Glasner slide 🏄‍♂️

#UECLfinal

[Timo Harvey @TimoHarvey]

What a ride it has been with Oliver Glasner 🫶 #CPFC

[UEFA Conference League @Conf_League]

Crystal Palace are the 2026 Conference League champions! 🏆

#UECLfinal x @CharlesDrawin

[Crystal Palace F.C. @CPFC]

European nights at Selhurst Park 🥰

@EuropaLeague 🤝

#CPFC

[Bobby Manzi @BobbyManzi]

We are the boys who will win your little game 👍🏼 #CPFC

[EuroFoot @eurofootcom]

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🇪🇸🏟️ Crystal Palace and Rayo Vallecano fans with tifo before the Conference League final! ✅ (@RyanTaylorSport)

[Timo Harvey @TimoHarvey]

@theawayfans @EllisMoore1904 The picture shows how foreigners see stereotypical Brit abroad on holiday.. 😅

[Timo Harvey @TimoHarvey]

@notcapnamerica Theres more here.

[Timo Harvey @TimoHarvey]

@tkotimaki Wharton ulkona... Ei ole toista pelaajaa Englannilla, joka osaisi syöttää samalla tavalla linjan taakse.

[Tom Dutton @TomDutty]

Sitting here watching a European final knowing little old Crystal Palace have a European final of their own in seven days is just bizarre. What a timeline for our club. 🦅

[Stan Collymore @StanCollymore]

VAR

I enthusiastically welcomed it. Was sold on the higher percentage of right decisions so we could all go home knowing football justice had been done and we could concentrate on which player was crap instead.

But I was wrong. Woefully and completely wrong.

Waiting 5 minutes for a decision to be made alone means the system isn't fit for purpose. Why? Because I sat with TV producers who said everything would be wrapped up in 10-30 seconds. It has literally taken the spontaneous joy from the most important part of the game. A goal.

Then, one thing completely blindsided me and many others.

Subjectivity.

I thought there would be science and a nailed on guarantee of a successfully and universally accepted decision. How wrong we were. Instead, arbitrary lines are drawn that simply can't with any certainty say whether a player is offside or not. So a human in a portacabin, 200 miles away only does what the referee can do, make a best guess.

Likewise handballs, dives, any penalty decision to be honest. A subjective decision decided out of stadium allowing an increasingly small and poor refereeing pool a get out of jail free card. Instead of them making a shit decision and owning it, they just pass it on 200 miles away so 3 men in a portacabin can make a shit decision instead. Lunacy.

For the love of the game, let's go back to investing in getting more referees, respecting them so that they join the trade and don't feel constantly abused. In short, treat them like rugby referees. Ultimate respect.

Then, fuck VAR off, it's ruined the game, made it petty and chaotic, and taken that one ingredient that you simply can't replace, instantaneous joy.

As a player and fan I accepted a referee making a bad decision in a game in the same way I accepted fucking up a shot or pass. We're all human.

Let's get back to that, humans doing their best, everyone walks away from the ground accepting that and less unrealistic pressure put on officials to be perfect when perfection doesn't exist in any walk of life.

VAR stinks. A system designed to help is a massive hindrance and it's about time pundits, fans, players, referees, clubs put pressure on authorities to get rid of it. We only need goal line tech, the rest can and should be refer refereed by humans making their best judgement. A best judgement that was over 98% right( audited fact pre VAR).

Enough is enough, fuck it off.

[The Athletic | Football @TheAthleticFC]

This has been a terrible week for VAR.

The events at West Ham, Tottenham Hotspur and Motherwell proved as much.

And to think its introduction was designed to “get rid of headline mistakes and scandals”. Instead, they have not been removed from the game but have in fact been piling up like never before.

Mistakes and scandals that are not just one-off errors, misses, lapses of judgment, but rather an inevitable part of the VAR system.

There is one clean clear simple solution for this, @JackPittBrooke argues.

That is full abolition without delay.

🔗 https://t.co/Upt9cS7FL1

[Jeff Stelling @JeffStelling]

@derro1962 @richie26188 @johnmerro1 Tribal, one-eyed perspective. What makes me fall out of love with football. Along with VAR of course. Night

[Times Sport @TimesSport]

"Seven years after VAR’s inception in England’s top flight, we still can’t stop losing sight of what VAR was introduced for. It’s supposed to step in for clear and obvious errors."

✍️ @GregorRoberts0n https://t.co/bhLExw4AOH