I'd say your bet is looking good. Slim Sam's last two interviews regarding Palaces's woes suggests he's fighting a losing battle. He says he had more time when he took over at Sunderland to sort things out and the owners should spend a much as they can afford to stay up. He sounds like a man waving goodbye to his Premiership survival bonus. It will take more than '19th Century football' for Palace to avoid the drop.
I love what your're saying and it's 99% correct apart from "The technical skill levels are higher".. Silva can't improve that, you should have said he's getting the players to use their skills more effectively It's quite incredible that he's had so much impact after 3 games, some of it will be down to confidence, the next test is to keep the confdence high during the coming up hard run of fixtures - we're unlikely to win or draw all of them.