A stoppage time goal from David Noble gave Bristol City a crucial win at Crystal Palace in a thrilling Coca-Cola Championship play-off semi-final, first leg.

The former West Ham trainee's last-gasp strike from 30 yards restored City's lead shortly after Ben Watson's penalty had cancelled out Louis Carey's opener.

After a goalless first half, Carey put the visitors ahead nine minutes after the restart with a curling effort which gave Julian Speroni no chance. But the Bristol-born defender and City captain blotted his copybook by conceding the 86th-minute penalty which allowed Watson to drag Palace level from the spot. However, Palace's celebrations were cut short when Noble's long range shot found the net to give City the edge going into the second leg on Tuesday.

Palace were the form team going into the play-offs and the only team not to have been in with a shout of automatic promotion. But City, who only came up from League One last season, have dusted themselves down from the disappointment of blowing the lead in the final straight and could yet complete remarkable back-to-back promotions.

Palace manager Neil Warnock warned City that their celebrations at the final whistle could come back to haunt them.

"I think you could see from their celebrations that they were already at Wembley. I didn't think much of their celebrations to be honest," he said."There was no need to go off like they did. They are 2-1 up but I think celebrations should be kept until you are through because football has a habit of getting you back."

City manager Gary Johnson tried to calm his players down at the final whistle, admitting he did not want them over-celebrating with the fans.

"I told the lads not to get carried away, it's only half-time and there's only a goal in it," he said. "It was a good performance but I did not want it to look like we were over-celebrating so I nipped that in the bud."

Warnock is looking to add a seventh promotion to his CV and had whipped a packed Selhurst Park to fever pitch, but it was City who made the brighter start. Lee Trundle forced a couple of early corners and Jamie McCombe was unable to get his header on target from Michael McIndoe's free-kick.

Palace were millimetres from a being awarded a penalty after 11 minutes when Scott Sinclair was felled by Nick Carle a fraction outside the area. McIndoe was claiming a spot-kick at the other end after being thwarted by Jose Fonte, but the Portuguese centre-half had timed his tackle to perfection.

City got a sight of goal eight minutes before the break when Dele Adebola outwitted Fonte on the byline and crossed towards Carle, whose shot was bravely blocked by Clint Hill. Moments later Adebola was denied by Speroni as he planted a firm downward header towards goal from Bradley Orr's cross.

After the break Watson fizzed a low shot narrowly wide, but it was City who finally made the breakthrough in the 54th minute. A well-worked free-kick routine saw Noble find Carle, who squared for Carey to find the top corner of Speroni's net with a superb first-time curling shot.

Warnock introduced James Scowcroft but the forward lasted just five minutes before being carried off on a stretcher with a hamstring injury that will surely rule him out of the return leg.

Watson put another header wide as Palace pushed for an equaliser, and they were rewarded four minutes from time when Carey, who had initially stumbled himself, dragged down makeshift forward Fonte. Watson stepped up to coolly convert his penalty past Adriano Basso to level the scores.

But City were not finished and Noble collected a loose ball in midfield, took one step forward and unleashed a rocket of a shot which flew into the top corner to give the visitors what could prove a priceless lead.

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