Crystal Palace were still finding their feet as a club back in 2012 when they signed Joel Ward from Portsmouth for £400k.
Steve Parish and the rest of CPFC 2010 had only recently saved the club from administration in 2010, and Ward arrived amongst a barrage of other surgical squad additions such as Yannick Bolasie, Glenn Murray, Mile Jedinak and Damien Delaney.
However, it is the £400k man who has outlasted all of these names at Selhurst Park, and boy has he flourished.
Since becoming an Eagle at the age of just 22, Ward is now 30 years of age and also a father, growing from a boy into a man at Crystal Palace.
He has 238 appearances for the club under his belt, one of which came in a playoff final at Wembley where it was his headed clearance off the line in the last minute of extra time that saved Palace from a nightmarish goal concession.
He also grabbed an assist for Jason Puncheon in an FA Cup final, and his signing was one that club chairman Steve Parish surely beams with pride over every time he thinks about it.
If you were to divide his transfer fee by his total number of appearances, you would make the eye-opening discovery that Ward has only cost the Eagles £1.68k per appearance, which is remarkable value for money.
The Crystal Palace No.2 is also the third-highest Premier League appearance maker in the club’s history with 187 top-flight outings under his belt, while he has been involved in the third-most Premier League wins in the Eagles’ history – Ward has partaken in 62 top-flight victories.
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Almost eight years on from his arrival at a time where Palace were perhaps just glad to be in existence, Ward has truly experienced every single emotion alongside the club on their rise back to the big time.
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