The 'genius’, after-hours chats and heartbreak fuelling Crystal Palace's bid to end their long wait for glory | OneFootball

Eagles dare to dream as they target first major trophy ahead of FA Cup final against Manchester City

Not until he spoke in the bowels of Wembley after Crystal Palace had hammered Aston Villa in the FA Cup semi-finals did Oliver Glasner entertain talk of the Eagles lifting major silverware for the first time. He’s not ignoring it any longer.

Glasner has got Palace going full throttle after a whirlwind 15 months at the helm, but now they must peak at the right time.

Their talisman, Eberechi Eze, scored only five goals in his first 30 games this season but has seven in his past 10. City could be in trouble.

It felt like a Palace procession, that Villa win last month. The way Palace muzzled the Champions League quarter-finalists had fans debating whether it rivalled the 4-3 semi-final win over Liverpool in 1990 as the club’s greatest day.

Oliver Glasner has Crystal Palace dreaming of FA Cup glory at Wembley

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Seal the club’s first major trophy on Saturday and that discussion stops dead.

As significant as any factor in their march to the final is their recruitment, and the exit of sporting director Dougie Freedman is a heavy blow.

Since Adam Wharton and Daniel Muñoz joined last year, two relative unknowns have been revelations.

Glasner replaced Roy Hodgson in February last year, and both players have blossomed.

Munoz is perfectly suited to the wing-back role, while 21-year-old Wharton has made the jump from the Championship to the Premier League look easy.

Absent from Sunday’s win over Spurs but “90 per cent” likely to play the final, according to Glasner, the midfielder must produce his crisp, wrapped passes at Wembley.

At first, Glasner, right, came across as pragmatic and stilted, but German journalists who followed him at Wolfsburg and Eintracht Frankfurt insist he is more charismatic today.

His relentlessly competitive nature contrasts with his laissez-faire philosophy for life.

It has built a togetherness founded on Glasner’s own experience as a player with Ried, where a team of modest players became greater than the sum of its parts and twice won the Austrian Cup.

Eberechi Eze starred in the semi-final win over Aston Villa and will be key to Palace’s chancing up upsetting Pep Guardiola’s side

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Glasner did not expect things to begin as strongly as they did.

Champions League form between Glasner’s arrival and last season’s end saw Palace thrash Manchester United 4-0, Villa 5-0, beat Liverpool at Anfield, and finish 10th.

Last summer was less rosy. Players away at international tournaments disrupted pre-season, and Michael Olise was sold to Bayern Munich. Glasner urged his players to trust the process in the dressing room at the City Ground after a 1-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest in late October.

The very next game, against Spurs, delivered a belated first league win of the season.

Palace have grown into the campaign, taking 14 of 18 points from the relegated sides while swimming away from the drop zone.

With players bang in form, including £12.7million summer bargain Ismaila Sarr, the season is ending strongly with a shot at glory.

Third time lucky?

It is one of English football’s anomalies that a club the size of Palace have never in their storied history lifted major silverware.

Under much-loved manager Steve Coppell, the Eagles beat Liverpool 4-3 in the 1990 semi-final to reach their maiden FA Cup final.

“The way the drama unfolded was incredible, because we had lost 9-0 to Liverpool that same season,” remembers John Salako. “I was so captivated with the FA Cup final, growing up. To play in the final is just… wow.

“Wrighty [Ian Wright] came on. After his broken leg, he’d been to see his faith healer. He scored two to take us 3-2 up [against Manchester United]. We should have won, but Mark Hughes equalised. It should have gone to penalties.”

Instead, there was a replay, 35 years ago to the day on Saturday. Palace lost 1-0, defender Lee Martin firing high past Nigel Martyn to deliver Alex Ferguson his first trophy as United’s manager.

“I couldn’t look at my runners-up medal for 20 years,” Salako recalls. “Walking past the trophy at the end, it was as distant as playing in the first round. I was miserable. But time goes by, you heal. I was part of an FA Cup final; that will live with me forever. At 21, you’re young and hungry and think you’ll get to multiple FA Cup finals and win it.”

Salako did get back to a Wembley, a year later, and scored in the final of the Zenith Data Systems Cup as Palace beat Everton 4-1. Not major silverware, but a trophy. For the Eagles, a new zenith is within touching distance.

The club’s only other FA Cup final came in 2016 and, again, it was United who spoilt the occasion.

The Palace manager was Alan Pardew, scorer of their semi-final extra-time winner against Liverpool 26 years prior.

“Alan brought me in as first-team coach. It’s the next-best thing to playing,” Salako explains. “We get through those early rounds, beat Spurs away in the last 16 as Martin Kelly scores the only goal.”

After Reading in the quarters and Watford in the semis, United awaited in what proved to be Louis van Gaal’s final game.

“We worked on the game-plan all week. It worked - we went 1-0 up after 78 minutes,” Salako recalls of Jason Puncheon’s goal, Pardew dancing his now-famed jig in celebration.

Crystal Palace lost 2-1 to Manchester United after extra-time in their last FA Cup final appearance in 2016

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“I was completely convinced we were going to get over that last hurdle and win that major trophy.”

The lead lasted just three minutes. In extra-time (there’s a theme here…), Chris Smalling was sent off but United still “found a way”, the winner a stunning volley driven home by Jesse Lingard.

“It was cruel, it was harsh,” says Salako.

There are no Red Devils to contend with this time, but their city rivals are every bit as dangerous.

Belief in the camp

Palace showed the oldest cup competition in the world more respect than most top-flight teams this season, Glasner resisting any temptation to make wholesale changes in the early rounds against Stockport and Doncaster.

The fifth-round 3-1 win over Millwall delivered the drama and controversy of Liam Roberts’ high kick to the ear of Jean-Philippe Mateta, the Frenchman requiring 25 stitches and donning his protective headband mask ever since.

When Glasner took his seat in the dugout at Craven Cottage for the quarter-final, the atmosphere raucous, he turned to his assistant Emmanuel Pogatetz and declared: “This is why I love football.”

What followed was utter dominance and a 3-0 win secured the date with Villa at Wembley. Now the final awaits.

Success is a double-edged sword, of course, and Palace are at risk of being raided.

Leading clubs are interested in Mateta, Munoz, Eze and Marc Guehi, as well as Glasner himself. Wharton’s long-term admirers include City themselves.

Adam Wharton has established himself as one of the best midfielders in the Premier League

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Palace, though, must have tunnel vision - all that matters right now is Saturday.

Though City are favourites - finalists for the third straight year - Palace have led after eight minutes in all three meetings with Pep Guardiola’s side under Glasner, beaten twice but scoring two goals on each occasion.

You don’t have to look far to find proof they can go toe-to-toe with City.

Chairman Steve Parish, who has invited Hodgson, Pardew and a host of the club’s former players to Wembley, says Glasner has “made all of us at the club think differently”.

For Salako, the manager has it all. “He is a genius. They’ve got more than enough to beat City. I think we’re going to take that big step.”

If they do, decisions will have to be made this summer ahead of a first foray into the Europa League.

Even before one or two of Palace’s stars have potentially been headhunted by European heavyweights, the current squad lacks depth, which risks an arduous, pioneering European campaign eating away at their league form.

On the flipside, “If we get into Europe, I think Eze will stay, Maxence Lacroix will stay, Guehi might stay, and we’ve got a better chance of keeping Wharton and Glasner,” suggests Salako.

Crystal Palace will be backed by brilliant support at Wembley this weekend

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The last decade has seen Hull, Southampton, Wolves, Brighton and West Ham in Europe. Why not Palace next?

“The players, fans and staff have all been in it together,” Palace striker Eddie Nketiah tells Standard Sport.

Nketiah believes he has made a “slow start” to life at Palace since joining from Arsenal last summer but insists: “There is so much more for me to give.”

He explains the squad genuinely enjoy each other’s company, often staying extra hours after training to chat.

Joel Ward and Will Hughes, he says, are the team’s most vocal leaders.

For Nketiah, a one-time England international, it was “really great to come on and get an assist” in the semi-final against Villa.

“You could see what it meant to the fans. They’re going to play their role again. I’ve played at Wembley a few times, but I have to say that was the best atmosphere created.”

Eagles supporters are as connected to this Palace team as to any previous iteration, adoring Wharton and Eze and the infectious, larger-than-life Mateta.

More than £45,000 has been raised to fund a tifo and other displays for Wembley.

Dean Henderson and Chris Richards donated £500 each, while Olympic gold-medallist triathlete and lifelong Palace fan Alex Yee contributed £160.

Nketiah lifted the FA Cup with Arsenal in 2020 and beams: “I have the best memory possible: winning it! Getting minutes in the final was amazing.

“It’s a special competition. I know that, having gone all the way. It would mean the world to do that with Palace. I know what it means to be a South Londoner; I have that proud feeling of being born and raised here. Some of my friends support Palace and live in the local area, and I really do feel connected with the club. The parade there would be amazing.”

That decade-old cliché that Palace are always 12th in the league holds true - they are - but now the chance to rock the boat, to hit the big time, arrives.

There seemed to be a hint of destiny about quite how ruthlessly the quarter-final and semi-final were won.

“Hopefully we can achieve something great together,” Nketiah says. “We’ve been working hard every day to make that dream come true.”