Dowie soldiers on with foreign legion

If Crystal Palace avoid relegation it will probably be thanks to football's united nations. Of the 11 players brought in since the club won promotion through the play-offs in May, seven are foreign including such unlikely suppliers of potential Premiership stars as Hungary and Ecuador.

In all, Palace now have 11 non-English players representing nine countries.

Italian striker Nicola Ventola and Uruguayan defender Gonzalo Sorondo both arrived on loan just hours before the transfer window closed on Tuesday. They may not be household names but the fact they have come from Inter Milan with promising reputations is grounds for hope.

And, after managing just one point from their first four games and appearing to miss out on a series of key transfer targets, Palace are in need of all the encouragement they can find.

Manager Iain Dowie said: "We needed to get players in to keep everything fresh.

"Ventola is highly rated with a good scoring record. He has had a lot of injuries but he is young enough and gives us a chance to be a bit stronger in forward areas.

"He gives us a bit of pace and has a nice touch and nice movement and hopefully we can get him back to what he was.

"Sorondo is a big, uncompromising centre-half who will do very well. He is a first-choice for Uruguay and, while we have not been ripped apart by anyone at the back, he gives us a bit of balance on the left side."

Before the arrival of Ventola, 26, and Sorondo, 24, even the everoptimistic Dowie was getting a creeping sense of foreboding about the season.

Dowie's attempts to add top-level strength in depth to his squad over the summer have been frustrated through a combination of low transfer budget, high prices and players unwilling to make the move to Selhurst Park.

Significant bids for Tim Cahill when he was at Millwall and Michael Carrick when at West Ham were accepted by the clubs but rejected by the players.

The Australian chose Everton and the Englishman went to Tottenham, so Palace had to test their knowledge of world football.

Dowie said: "I cannot put my finger on quite why we have missed some of our targets. The Britishbased players are more expensive and harder to get and it has been a bit frustrating at times.

"We came from fourth bottom and ended up getting promoted last season so our international scouting network was not great. But we have researched long and hard and have been going to see a lot of games all over the place.

When you are told someone like Ivan Kaviedes has become available that is not a problem because he is Ecuador's captain and I knew him from his time at Celta Vigo. We were also fortunate to have him on trial before we signed him and he is a good player.

"At other times we have had to make decisions without as much knowledge as we would have liked but that will be remedied come January."

Only four of Palace's summer signings are English, with two coming from the reserve teams of Premiership clubs and the others from League One teams.

Fitz Hall cost £1.5million from Southampton but the rest of Dowie's new players have arrived for very little. Palace's total outlay on transfer fees has been around £3m with Ventola, Sorondo and Kaviedes arriving on loan.

Palace's approach has contrasted strongly with those of the other clubs who are likely to be battling it out with them near the bottom of the table at the end of the season. While newly promoted Norwich have been relatively inactive in the transfer market, West Brom have spent more than £6m.

Portsmouth have added to a squad which stayed up last season while Everton will have money to spend from Wayne Rooney's sale.

But Dowie said: "Our squad is developing and we will keep fighting and working hard to reach our goals. We would have liked to get a couple more players in but all we can do now is make sure that when the next transfer window comes we can act quickly. By January we should be very well organised."

Once Dowie gets Hungarian striker Sandor Torghelle and Neil Shipperley back from injury, he hopes his cosmopolitan squad will really gel.

More immediately, decent results in their next two games, against Portsmouth and Manchester City, will go a long way towards ensuring they have the chance.

Kaviedes, meanwhile, has been sent home by Ecuador ahead of their World Cup qualifier with Uruguay on Sunday.

He was dropped after leaving the team base without permission for meetings with the club he is on loan from, Barcelona de Guayaquil.

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