When Nicky Butt and David Beckham dazzled at Palace

Although Harrison’s Reds were cruising at that point in the 1992 final, Stuart McCall pulled one back for the Eagles with only four minutes remaining to give them some hope. That was quickly extinguished when Beckham provided the assist and Butt struck again past Jimmy Glass, before the final whistle, to set up the second leg at Old Trafford.

Palace did score in the first minute in Manchester, through Andy McPherson, but we ultimately swept the young Eagles aside 3-2 on the night, 6-3 on aggregate.

Ben Thornley’s solo strike and Simon Davies’s drive put the Reds back in full control and, although McCall beat Kevin Pilkington to level the second leg at 2-2, Colin McKee glanced in Ryan Giggs’s cross to provide the icing on United’s cake. Butt would have scored the best goal of the tie, had his overhead kick not been denied by Glass’s flying save.

Giggs did not play in the first leg in the capital as he was needed for the senior team’s home game with Southampton in the old Division One, a couple of days later. The boy wonder helped the Reds earn a 1-0 win, courtesy of a goal from fellow winger Andrei Kanchelskis, that seemed to put us on course for the title, only for the fixture backlog to contribute to a late collapse, which allowed Leeds United to take the trophy.