Following on from the club’s highest-ever finish the previous season – third in the old First Division, with a remarkable 20 wins from 38 league matches – a high bar had been set by Steve Coppell and his side.
In truth, injuries to key squad members such as John Salako, plus the sale of top scorer Ian Wright to champions Arsenal in September – the forward having expressed his desire to play European football, at that time only awarded to the top two sides – curtailed a hefty amount of that momentum.
While an up-and-down campaign yielded a midtable finish, the 91/92 season was not without its highlights, principle among them a league double against the previous season’s runners-up, Liverpool.
The first leg of that feat came, of course, at Anfield in November 1991, when Coppell’s team – who had won six of their opening 13 matches prior – stunned Merseyside by overturning Glenn Hysén’s header at the end of the first-half.
That comeback came courtesy of a first league goal in Palace colours for new signing Marco Gabbiadini – assisted with a low ball in by a certain Gareth Southgate – and a bullet header by Geoff Thomas from a corner.