1990 FA Cup Final

The 1990 FA Cup Final was a football match contested by Manchester United and Crystal Palace at Wembley Stadium, London, England. The match finished 3–3 after extra time. Bryan Robson and Mark Hughes (2) scored for United; Gary O'Reilly and Ian Wright (2) for Palace. Ian Wright had only recently returned from a broken leg that kept him out of the semi-final.

In the replay, United won 1–0 with a goal from Lee Martin – only the second goal he would score for the club. It saw them match Aston Villa and Tottenham Hotspur's record of seven FA Cup triumphs. Crystal Palace, in contrast, had never played in either an FA Cup or Football League Cup final before.

This was the first FA Cup final to be played in front of an all-seater crowd, as Wembley's remaining standing areas had been converted to all-seater in the autumn of 1989.

The month before the final, UEFA had announced that the ban on English clubs in European competitions would be lifted for the 1990–91 season, provided that England fans behaved well at that summer's World Cup. England fans duly behaved well at the tournament, and this gave the green light to United to compete in the 1990–91 European Cup Winners' Cup, which they ultimately won. It also proved to be the turning point in Manchester United's history after a few lean seasons; over the next 20 years they collected a total of more than 20 major trophies.

If Crystal Palace had won the trophy, it would have gained them the first major trophy of their history and given them European qualification for the first time as well. More than 20 years on, they have yet to achieve either of these things.

The 1990 Crystal Palace team was the last all-English team to play in an FA Cup final.

The 1990 FA Cup win was the third time Bryan Robson had been in the winning side in an FA Cup final; he had also now scored a total of three goals in FA Cup finals. He was the only player left from the 1983 FA Cup winning team, in which he had scored two goals in the final replay. He left the club just after their 1994 FA Cup final win, but was denied a fourth FA Cup winner's medal as he was not included into the squad for the final.

United's squad had changed so much since the appointment of Alex Ferguson as manager in November 1986 that Mark Hughes (bought back from Barcelona in 1988 after two years in Spain) was the only player in the team other than Robson still at the club who had featured in the 1985 FA Cup winning side.

Read more about 1990 FA Cup Final:  First Game, Replay, Cup Final Song, Match Details

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