London: James McArthur has conceded that Crystal Palace’s game at Watford on Boxing Day has become a “must win” match as Alan Pardew’s beleaguered side desperately seek to reinvigorate their season after a miserable run of results.

The defeat against Chelsea on Saturday was Palace’s eighth loss in 10 topflight games, and a 22nd of the calendar year, to leave the south London team hovering just above the relegation zone.

All the optimism generated by an active summer in the transfer market, during which the club broke their transfer record first to sign Andros Townsend and then Christian Benteke, has long since evaporated with scrutiny intensifying on the manager’s position.

Pardew must still convince the club’s co-owners and investors that he is the right man to instigate a revival, with the likes of Sam Allardyce and Chris Coleman mooted as potential replacements, and identify new players to arrest the decline in January.

But the squad have been left intensely frustrated by a year of poor results and recognise that in the wake of narrow defeats against Manchester United and Chelsea, they cannot afford to lose against an inconsistent Watford at Vicarage Road. “We stayed in the game against Chelsea, defensively we were very sound, and we passed the ball better than we have for a long time, but now we have to take those qualities to Watford on Boxing Day,” McArthur said.

“That’s now a massive game for the club. It’s another chance to turn our season around. It’s not nice being down there, I’m not going to lie, but instead of doom and gloom, we need to look at the next game as an opportunity to turn it round. There are a lot of games to go but, right now, we are in a relegation scrap and we’re not hiding away from it.

“In that changing room, everyone is confident we have more than enough quality to climb the table. We have some big characters and it only takes one win for us to pick up and build momentum. But we know Watford is a must win for us. Our last two defeats have been against top-class sides and we pushed them both all the way, but need that killer instinct. There is no doubting the effort and determination is there to turn our season around — the spirit here is incredible — but we’ve got to take those qualities into the next few games.”

Those sentiments are shared by Pardew, who continues to liaise with the chairman, Steve Parish, over the recruitment of a left-back and forward next month. “You have to be realistic and say that, this year, the results have not been good enough really, so we need to make sure they are better in the next year,” said Palace’s manager of almost two years.

“We had a great 2015, a brilliant 2015. And we now need to replicate that in 2017 in the second half of this season and the first half of next season. We can do that. We accept the stats everyone is throwing around at us and we have to put it right.”