Wilfried Zaha’s reputation goes before him in the eyes of Premier League referees, says James McArthur

Wilfried Zaha’s Crystal Palace team-mates are convinced that his reputation as a diver is stopping him getting proper protection from referees.

The winger believed he was targeted by Huddersfield’s players during Palace’s 1-0 victory at the John Smith’s Stadium on Saturday, expressing his anger in an interview for BBC’s Match of the Day, in which he claimed feeling that he would have to suffer a broken leg for an opponent to be booked.

Zaha scored a superb individual goal seven minutes before half-time, on his return from a groin injury, to end Palace’s three-match losing run, but he continues to attract controversy as well as plaudits.

Ten minutes before his goal, he reacted furiously to being hacked down Mathias Jorgensen, writhing around on the pitch as his team-mates called for a red card, rather than the yellow that the Huddersfield defender was shown. His frustration still bubbling, Zaha was then booked himself moments later for a wild challenge on Florent Hadergjonaj.

Officially, Zaha has been fouled 11 times in the Premier League this season, but his team-mates believe that total would be much higher if referees gave him a fair hearing.

Palace midfielder James McArthur said: “I think Wilfried gets treated quite unfairly to be honest. He gets so many kicks – and because he gets so many kicks, he goes down.

“People think he goes down too easily, but he doesn’t. If you look at the games, he gets kicked so much and tries to stay up to get an advantage and get away from his man.

“When I saw it [the tackle by Jorgensen], I thought it was a poor challenge. When Wilf then got his booking, it didn’t look to me that he had done too much wrong, but the crowd reacted.

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“Wilf can’t make a challenge now. Any time he makes a challenge, the crowd get on him and put the referee under pressure. I feel sorry for him in that way.”

Zaha’s value to Palace is huge – he has scored three of their four league goals this season, while his team-mates have lost the past 12 top-division matches in which he has not played, failing to score in 10 of them.

McArthur said: “Listen, he’s a tremendous talent and there’s no doubt when he’s in our team we are a better team, we’re more dangerous.

“I hope he keeps scoring. His end product got better last year and it’s even better this year. If he keeps playing like that, we can have a good season.”

Huddersfield, who hit the post through Aaron Mooy in the second half, are desperately short of a cutting edge, having scored just once at home in all competitive matches since 11 February.

Goalkeeper Jonas Lossl said: “We need to take our chances. We need to step forward and take responsibility, but we also need to continue this good work. We put in a good performance here and we just needed that little bit of luck.

“I have no doubt that all of my team-mates in there are trying their utmost to score. We just need to continue this effort and performance and the results will come.”