Oliver Glasner saluted his Crystal Palace players after a 2-0 home win over Newcastle achieved mission number one of another season of Premier League football at Selhurst Park.
This latest result which clinched mathematical safety was down to in-form Jean-Philippe Mateta, who struck a second-half brace to make it eight goals in nine matches since the arrival of Glasner in February.
When Glasner replaced Roy Hodgson, Palace were only five points above the relegation zone but this third consecutive victory moved them up to 39 points and 14 above the drop zone with only 12 left to play for.
“Now we hope for four in a row,” Glasner insisted.
“It was a great performance and all the credit to the players for the performance, for the energy, for the intensity and for the offensive way of playing always trying to score goals.
“Of course it is a good feeling now to have completed mission number one; staying in the Premier League mathematically.
“Yes, it is a good feeling and I hope the players get addicted to winning games, to this feeling, to this emotion.”
Palace were dominant from the off with Eberechi Eze pulling the strings after he flashed an early effort wide before he set up Mateta for a chance that he headed over.
It remained goalless until half-time but Mateta changed that in the 55th minute when he slid home after a slick one-two with Jordan Ayew.
That goal made it five consecutive home games where Mateta has scored and while Newcastle pushed for a leveller, being denied a 76th-minute penalty when Sean Longstaff went down in the area after a slight pull by Will Hughes, Palace made the points safe with two minutes left.
Hughes exchanged passes with substitute Jeffrey Schlupp before he teed up Mateta, who scuffed through the legs of Martin Dubravka for his 14th goal in all competitions this season.
Glasner added: “It is all about that we are a unit on the pitch and then of course the strikers are then in the position where they can score and then can show their quality.
“He has a lot of qualities and he now has the confidence. The second goal was one touch with the left-foot. Now for me it is important we stay humble.
“For us, it’s staying hungry and staying ambitious because everything we do we do for our club, for our fans and for us as a group.
“Now we feel how good it is, everyone knows how good it is to win a game.
“Since the Liverpool game now we’re flying on a cloud and it is so nice there because it is sunny, not rainy like below the cloud. We want to keep this feeling until the end of the season.”
Newcastle entered this match fresh after a 10-day break and after three wins from their last four, but produced a sluggish display to lose ground in the battle for a top-six finish with Manchester United.
Eddie Howe acknowledged: “Yeah, very disappointed with the performance.
“We were disappointed with most aspects of our play. We have to take responsibility for that.
“Maybe the gap between games didn’t help us on reflection but still, we knew it was there and we had to perform better than we did.
“It was a missed opportunity.”
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