Roy Keane refused to blame Jon Stead's red card for his side going down at Selhurst Park.

The Town striker was harshly dismissed in the first-half for a challenge on Feddie Sears, one minute after the Eagles had cancelled out Jaime Peters' early opener through Jose Fonte's volley..

Neil Danns put the home side in front on the hour with Victor Moses completing the scoring in added on time.

"It's never easy when you are a man down but I was very disappointed with the way we reacted after Steady went off," said the Town boss.

"We didn't keep the ball well and we gave away two bad goals. The third one I'm not worried about because we were throwing men forward.

"Jon's tackle looked a typical striker's challenge, clumsy but I don't want to talk too much about that being the key. We had to react to that and we didn't and that's very disappointing. There are lots of ways to lose a game and I didn't like the way we lost that one.

"It shows you that we miss Grant Leadbitter and Jon Walters and I was hoping I wouldn't have to say that and I think our best players were the younger ones, Jack Colback, Jaime Peters and Connor Wickham, when he came on.

"Jack has the chance to go on and be a top player because he's got the right character. There are a lot of good players out there but the ones with the right character go on and achieve something."