James McArthur was delighted to score his first goal for Crystal Palace in Saturday’s 1-1 draw at home to Stoke City, and is keen to use it as a springboard for more goals.

The Scottish midfielder opened the scoring after just 11 minutes with a looping header over Asmir Begovic, to open his account for the Eagles, but Peter Crouch’s equaliser only two minutes later earned the Potters a share of the spoils.

The single points keeps the Eagles hovering just one point above the Premier League trapdoor.

McArthur admitted he did not think he got a clean connection with the ball for his goal.

He said: "I want to add more goals to my game and I think I can here, especially when we’re playing three in midfield, it gives me the license to get forward.

“Joe [Ledley] is the same. As a team we want to add goals throughout the team and keep pushing ourselves.

“I think it hit my head and then my shoulder. I don’t know, I’m not sure to be honest, I can’t really remember.”

The former Wigan Athletic man also took partial blame for Crouch’s equaliser, but felt it was important the team avoided defeat.

“That was really disappointing for us a team, me and Joe maybe pushed forwards too much to get that second goal.

“It’s obviously counted against us, but we move on to another good game next week.

Wimbledon Times:

Combative: James McArthur in the Palace midifled on Saturday afternoon          SP89019

“It was very important we didn’t lose the game. it’s about making sure you don’t lose games as well. We obviously want to do everything we can to win the game but it’s important we don’t lose it as well.”

The summer signing also reserved special praise for the Palace supporters.

He added: “They do it every week for us and they’re going to be needed in the future, they help us so much when times are hard.

“Recently we’ve been conceding goals and getting back into games and winning and picking up points and they’re a big part of that as well.

“I’ve always had a great relationship with the fans at the clubs I’ve been with but the fans here are very loud, very rowdy, and noisy and they’re like Wigan in the sense that it’s a family club.”