CRYSTAL Palace thumped Middlesbrough 4-1 at Selhurst Park on Saturday, with top goalscorer Glenn Murray scoring an absolute beauty in front of England manager Roy Hodgson.
Even though the national boss was more likely to have been watching Wilfried Zaha, he would have walked away from SE25 having seen one of the best strikes Selhurst Park has witnessed this season.
"I'm happy at the end of the game," boss Ian Holloway said. "The first half I was a bit disappointed. I challenged the lads I thought we didn't move it quickly enough and they've been looking a lot better than that this week."
It was the Eagles that took the lead after just nine minutes when Wilfried Zaha made great strides down the right, beating his marker and delivering a ball across the six-yard box for Murray to tap home his 26th goal of the season.
Just three minutes into the second half Palace extended their lead.
After Jonny Williams had won a corner, Dobbie sent the ball towards the far post for Murray, who headed back into mix and Peter Ramage was on hand to fire the ball home on the turn.
It was his fourth goal of the season and you would have thought he was a striker with such an accomplished finish.
However, if that took you by surprise, it got even better nine minutes later when Murray scored an absolute belter in front of the Holmesdale Stand.
Picking the ball up 20 yards out, he teed the ball up onto his left foot and unleashed an unstoppable shot into the top corner.
It was arguably his best strike of his 27 goals this season - and what a way to do it in front of the national boss. Was he really there to watch Zaha?
Middlesbrough gave themselves a lifeline on 80 minutes when Faris Haroun latched onto a ball inside the box before slotting the ball under Speroni.
But Phillips killed the visitors off when he scored his second goal in consecutive games with a left-footed finish from another Zaha assist.
Palace: Speroni, Richards, Parr, Ramage, Delaney, Dikgacoi (Butterfield 76), Jedinak, Williams (Phillips 70), Dobbie (Bolasie 81), Zaha, Murray.