Albion chief Steve Coppell is going to the Palace again for a royal escape from relegation.

Coppell will be on the phone this week to Alan Pardew, his former Crystal Palace midfielder now in charge at Reading.

The play-off bound Royals must win at Stoke on Sunday and Albion beat already relegated Grimsby at Blundell Park for the Seagulls to survive on goal difference.

Saturday's 4-0 win against Watford at Withdean, combined with Stoke's late 1-0 defeat at Palace, has set up a dramatic finish to the season.

Coppell said: "I've found to my cost if you phone people up and ask for a favour it never works.

"I didn't phone Steve Kember (Palace caretaker), but I will probably ring Alan Pardew to say well done for what they have achieved this season.

"Alan wants to win every game, I know that. Teams going into the play-offs should try and maintain good form, because if you have a breather it's hard to pick up the pace again.

"I've been involved in the play-offs myself and I've found the best way to handle the situation is to really keep on pushing and maintain the momentum Reading undoubtedly have at the moment."

Coppell is warning his players Albion can expect no favours from Grimsby, even though they are stranded at the bottom of the table and went down a week ago.

"It's human nature to want to be party poopers. We will have a big crowd there and I know if roles were reversed my players would be in the dressing room saying let's spoil the party.

"The Grimsby players will be of exactly the same mind. For the last month we have been saying no one's going to help us, we've got to do the work ourselves and we'll be trying to do that.

"I've always just had that sneaking feeling it would go to the last game and we cannot ask anything more now.

"In the couple of games prior to this I think even the Stoke people would say they've had a little bit more than their fair share of lady luck.

"It's still an awful lot to ask, but at least we've got a chance. They are at home and they know a draw will do them. If you went to the bookmakers they would still be red-hot favourites, but you never know."

Former Palace stalwart Simon Rodger, forced off early in the second half on Saturday by a knock to his broken toe, said: "It's nice to see Palace do us a favour. I thought it was going to end 0-0.

"It was the biggest reception we had when the news went around they had scored, bigger than for any of our goals!

"It adds a bit of spice to the Grimsby game and hopefully Reading can do us a favour as well."

Gary Hart also went off injured, while Paul Brooker and Richard Carpenter both missed Albion's biggest win of the season with a virus.

Match report at thisisthealbion.co.uk