Glasner’s message to our supporters
Speaking to Palace TV from the Wembley dugout at the culmination of a momentous day, Oliver Glasner had a simple, special message for the Crystal Palace supporters: enjoy it.
On winning the FA Cup…
I still can't believe it. It was such a great game. Such a great atmosphere.
Our fans were unbelievable. I think now, we're all starting to realise how big this achievement is.
It was a special day. It was a special win. It was a special game. So tough to play, but the players did so well and defended with such a passion and desire.
Now we really made it real, winning the FA Cup. Especially, our fans deserve to win this trophy, because they always supported us with a very difficult start [to the season]. They always stood to us. They always supported us. They were never complaining. They were never shouting at us.
I think this is now where everybody gets the reward, especially our fans. They helped us to win this Cup – thanks a lot.
On the belief in his side…
There's no button. We don't have a belief button. These are things they are developing over months. And it's just with a work ethic, with a mindset every day in training, every day, every game day.
Then, of course, you need also the evidence. We had the evidence in many big games: at the Emirates, against Villa here, and in many other games. Then it starts and I think also our fans got this belief because they could see they always played their way. Of course, today we wanted to hit the ball more but also credit to City how well they played.
But we're always believing that we can score goals. If you don't score a goal for 10 games nobody believes in it. But we're always scoring and we're always creating our situations from different phases of the game. And today, yes, we were very efficient.
It felt like the first time in the opposition's half and then we scored a goal. And I think this all helped us to create this belief. And then it's again the togetherness, it's the spirit and this helps you to overcome difficult moments in the season, in the game.
And I think this is now again, it's the reward for all of us.
On 10 minutes added time at the end…
To be honest, I talked to the fourth official, and said ‘I think eight would be enough’ and he said ‘oh, you should be lucky that it's not more than 10!’ and I said ‘OK, it's good’.
And then, yeah, it's just 10 more minutes to fight as a team and do everything not to concede a goal and this is what the players did and we survived the extra time and now we are FA Cup winners.
On his message to the players afterwards…
It's just a sum up of the FA Cup journey of our season and the messages I told the players, the group, the staff over months and now we all have the reward.
We spoke about it before Stockport in January when we started our FA Cup journey, and even in the Carabao we played the quarter-final and we lost and it's out, and then we started the next one and this is what I said: we started to win it.
Of course it was far away and then it's hard work and always being together and accepting decisions. I had to take many difficult decisions again, Will [Hughes] and Jeff [Lerma] not starting who played such a great game at Tottenham, and everybody accepted it. Everybody was here for the team. Jeff then played as a centre-back and defended so well so that just makes me proud of the group, and this was more or less the message.
On Crystal Palace in the Europa League…
Honestly today it feels so far away, and I hope I start to get into the party mode, because still I really can't believe it.
We all should enjoy this day and we should really now make a big party because these memories will stay forever, and then there is enough time to think about Europe, think about next year – but today: enjoy the moment, enjoy the day, and celebrate.
On a first-ever major trophy in the club’s history…
Thank you very much. I think it's really special, and it's really special for the club and very special for all our fans.
I think this trophy is really dedicated to our fans, to our supporters, who always were behind us and always pushed us, always supported us, so thanks a lot for this and really if somebody deserves this trophy, then it's you – enjoy it.