Author: Ed Aarons

Thousands turned out on the wet streets of south London to catch a glimpse of the club’s first major trophy

Crystal Palace supporters had waited a lifetime for this moment. When the two buses carrying Oliver Glasner and his FA Cup winners rounded the corner of Holmesdale Road, red and blue smoke from flares filled the air as thousands of south Londoners showed their appreciation, with several shedding tears again.

In the days since Eberechi Eze’s winner against Manchester City clinched Palace’s first trophy, a sense of disbelief has been the overwhelming feeling for fans who are excitedly contemplating a foray into Europe next season.

• Manager ‘100% here’ despite Tottenham links
• Palace without Wharton and Guéhi for visit of Wolves

Oliver Glasner believes that Crystal Palace can avoid becoming a “one-hit wonder” after winning the FA Cup by continuing to make steady progress and not doing “crazy things”.

Palace’s victory against Manchester City secured the club’s first major trophy and entry into the Europa League. Glasner revealed he had left the post-match celebrations at Wembley before the club chair, Steve Parish, was captured on video performing karaoke at a local bar and that he had missed Austria’s Eurovision song contest victory on the same evening because he was with family. “It must be a great song,” he said.

There was a sense of disbelief at Wembley as the team I support ended a wait of almost 120 years to win a major trophy

When Marc Guéhi and Joel Ward went up to collect the FA Cup, we were there. Although it still seems like a dream. The sense of disbelief Crystal Palace supporters felt when the full-time whistle at Wembley ended their wait to win a major trophy will probably take a few more days to fade away given it’s taken almost 120 years to become a reality. But with most of the 30,000 wearing red and blue having travelled from south London in hope rather than expectation, finally, it was our moment.

After an agonising 10 minutes of stoppage time that seemed to take an eternity, the emotions of defeat in Palace’s two previous FA Cup finals came pouring out. Everywhere you looked there were grown men – including me and the former Guardian stalwart Dominic Fifield – moved to tears. The comedian Mark Steel just kept shaking his head, unable to comprehend what had just transpired. It even spread to the royal box, where the chair, Steve Parish, who had been pictured with his head in his hands moments earlier, was greeted with a bear hug from Palace’s largest shareholder, John Textor.

The Crystal Palace manager cut his teeth in the Austrian and German Bundesligas, while a health scare helped form his approach to life

Siegmund Gruber didn’t take long to decide Oliver Glasner was his man. “We were convinced from the moment we met him,” says the chief executive of the Austrian club Lask. “Oliver started his presentation and it was like that scene in Jerry Maguire: ‘You had me at hello.’”

It was the summer of 2015 and the future Crystal Palace manager had been persuaded to leave SV Ried, where he had made more than 500 appearances and been named player of the century before taking over as manager the previous year, for their main rivals. What made things worse was that Lask, after going bankrupt under the previous owners and losing their stadium, had just been promoted from the third division, while Ried had finished mid-table in the Austrian Bundesliga.

Manager elated at semi-final win against Aston Villa but keen to ensure players keep their eye on league form

Oliver Glasner is not the kind of manager who makes bold predictions, although it seems to be a different story behind the scenes. A few hours after Crystal Palace’s epic 3-0 victory over Aston Villa in the FA Cup semi-finals, a video of the Austrian’s post-match team talk was released on social media, where he had outlined his expectations of his players during a training camp in Marbella in March.

“I told you guys, this is because I know you guys and I know your talent, especially I know your character, that we can achieve outstanding things this year,” Glasner said. “I felt it, guys, that we are able to achieve, to write history for Crystal Palace. We fully deserve a place in the final, but it’s not the final.”

With Oliver Glasner and top players attracting interest, south London club know they must seize FA Cup opportunity

For Crystal Palace supporters of a certain vintage, Malcolm Allison and his famous fedora is where it all began. Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the club’s first FA Cup semi-final appearance, under the maverick former Manchester City manager, when they were in the old Third Division.

Allison had already changed Palace’s nickname from the Glaziers to the Eagles and their colours to red and blue within a few months of his arrival from City in March 1973. It was after their third-round victory over non-league Scarborough that he decided to keep wearing the lucky hat that had bizarrely been inspired by the “spats” – fabric shoe covers – worn by Portsmouth’s 1939 Cup-winning manager, Jack Tinn.

Crystal Palace defender on dreaming of FA Cup glory, Oliver Glasner and the importance of faith to the team

Maxence Lacroix is treating Saturday’s FA Cup semi-final at Wembley as just another game but the same can’t be said of his mother. “She’s more stressed than me right now,” the Crystal Palace defender says. “But I think it’s really good for a mother or father to see their son running his dream and playing this type of game because she knew it was difficult before and now she sees her son growing, having a family and doing what he wants. So I think she’s proud, a little bit stressed but it’s all right.”

Growing up in Ajat, a village in the Dordogne, Lacroix knew he was never going to follow in his mother Corrine’s footsteps by becoming a doctor. Having moved to Germany from the French side Sochaux as a 20-year-old after coming through the prestigious Clairefontaine academy, he reunited with Oliver Glasner – his former manager at Wolfsburg – in south London last summer. The elegant defender is the heartbeat of the Palace side that will face Aston Villa for a place in the final and has been tipped to win his first senior cap sooner rather than later after representing France at every youth level.