- Dean Henderson says his team-mate had a prophecy which came true
- Crystal Palace lifted their first trophy by beating Man City 1-0 in the FA Cup final
- LISTEN NOW: It’s All Kicking Off! Was Cole Palmer right to leave Man City?
Crystal Palace FA Cup hero Dean Henderson has revealed he was told on the morning of his team’s famous win that he would save a penalty.
Palace keeper Henderson became the fourth in history to save a spot-kick in an FA Cup final, diving to his right in the first half to repel Omar Marmoush’s strike.
Henderson was perhaps lucky to still be on the field having handled the ball outside his area earlier in the game as City striker Erling Haaland ran through.
But afterwards the England international revealed that Remi Matthews, one of the club’s reserve goalkeepers, had a premonition at the team hotel yesterday morning.
Henderson said: ‘To be fair, Remi actually said to me in my room this morning: “You’re going to have a worldie today and you’re going to save a penalty and it came true.
‘I just said: “Yeah, I will”.
Dean Henderson says reserve goalie Remi Matthews foresaw his FA Cup final penalty save
Henderson denied Omar Marmoush from 12 yards as Crystal Palace beat Manchester City 1-0
Matthews (right) told him he would have a ‘worldie’ and save a penalty in the morning
‘Obviously, when he got the ball, I thought: “Yeah, it’s right, it’s happening”.
‘I genuinely did think it was our time as a football club.
‘The fans have been phenomenal. They deserve this day.
‘It’s been so many years in the making and I just throught that today would be the day.
‘We did our homework on the penalties on the morning. He [Marmoush] hasn’t actually taken a penalty for City but we know he needs to keep his pace at that side every time.
‘We knew if I got a step in early I might have a chance of saving it, which I did.
‘He hit it well and thankfully kept it out.
‘It’s incredible really. So many setbacks, so many disappointments in football. But you keep going, you keep coming back to get the job done.
Palace lifted their first ever trophy and booked their place in next season’s Europa League
‘Obviously, an Englishman knowing what the FA Cup means, it’s actually phenomenal.
‘To do it with Crystal Palace is even better. It’s so difficult to win this trophy, even if you’re a top side.’
Palace won the first major trophy in their history thanks to Eberechi Eze’s 16th minute strike. Henderson survived the red card moment seven minutes later.
‘I actually genuinely thought it was inside the box,’ he said.
‘I was waiting for it to skip up off the turf because normally it’s wet out there but obviously the sun dried it up.
‘But obviously it was going away from goal anyway so I’m not so sure what the problem was.’
