I didn't owe Palace team-mates, Benteke claims

He opened the scoring in a 3-0 win over Leicester City on Saturday, but Christian Benteke did not feel obliged to make amends to his Crystal Palace team-mates for missing a late penalty against Bournemouth.

The Belgium international took a spot-kick against the orders of manager Roy Hodgson and failed to score in the 2-2 draw at Selhurst Park last weekend.

But he converted Andros Townsend's cross in the first half at King Power Stadium to score for the first time this season.

Palace's first away goal since April was followed by two more for Wilfried Zaha and Bakary Sako, but Benteke, speaking to Sky Sports after the match, rejected suggestions he needed to deliver for his colleagues.

"It was not that I owed [them] something because we are a team and always work together, but I wanted to show I am always involved and I wanted to do everything to get back on form," he said.

"It's a great result. We didn't give them [Leicester] anything, they had a few chances but we deserved the three points.

"I've been really patient. But I'm a big believer, and I got what I deserved to get.

"I won't give up. I will just keep going. 

"I think Wilf and myself worked really hard to close down their midfielders and today we got the chances to score as well."

Having climbed out of the bottom three, Zaha was full of enthusiasm about his side's prospects during the second half of the campaign. 

"The team's buzzing," he said.

"We played so well today. We just took our chances so I'm just happy for the squad.

"Teams think that because Benteke wins headers most of the time, they perhaps don't realise that we can play as well, so when the chances came we had to take them.

"The main thing was to get the next goal at 1-0, so when I got the chance I just thought I had to hit the target.

"We have confidence in the team. We're having a good run, it was only a matter of time before we put the performances together and got up the table."