MANCHESTER UNITED - 1995-96 SEASON
THE DOUBLE DOUBLE!
For the last five years Manchester United had been the dominant force in English football, and the Old Trafford faithful had every reason to think that United could win a couple of trophies every season - until this one.
This United team had missed out on the previous season's Premiership title by one point, and had lost the FA Cup final to Everton.
To make matters worse, Paul Ince, Andrei Kanchelskis and Mark Hughes all left the club in the close season, and the big signing the United fans expected did not arrive.
'Eric the king' had abdicated the throne temporarily due to an FA revolution and was now in exile in the stands - He was to be recrowned on August 1st.
For the first time in years people were questioning Alex Ferguson's judgement. The replacements for the players who left were all from the Manchester United reserves. Nicky Butt, Paul Scholes, David Beckham and the Neville brothers were all extremely talented, but lacked the big match experience needed to suceed in English football.
The season opened at Villa Park, and all the doubts in peoples minds seemed to be proved right, United's 'kids' rolled over and lost 2-0.
Straight away the knives were out for Ferguson, but he stuck to his guns and the team won the next five league games.
Eric Cantona returned on the 1st October, in the home league game against Liverpool, within one minute of returning he set up a goal for Nicky Butt, and later in the game secured a draw with a penalty for the reds.
United made steady progress in the League, but were always in the shadow of Kevin Keegan's Newcastle, who were wowing the country with their cavalier attacking play.
The treatment room at Old Trafford must have resembled an airport in December, with nearly all of United's players checking in at one point of the month.
The situation got so bad that Alex Ferguson took another Frenchman, William Prunier, on loan for a couple of weeks to help shore up the defence.
United met Newcastle just after Christmas at Old Trafford. Andy Cole, who wasn't having the best of seasons opened the scoring with a wonderful goal and United won the game 2-0.
It wasn't until January that Eric Cantona started to produce the form that everybody knew he was capable of, a wonderful goal against West Ham seemed to ignite the fire in his french belly.
After the new year in the Premiership, United's figues are; played 17, won 13, drawn 2, lost 2.
Cantona seemed to be scoring in every game, saving United in a series of 1-0 victories, including one against Newcastle at St James' Park. Cantona was on a personal crusade to the title, ably helped by Peter Schmeichel - performing heroics in goal, and Roy Keane - running his legs off in midfield.
As the season was nearing it's end United seemed to be getting stronger whilst Newcastle were stumbling and stuttering towards second place.
At one point of the season Newcastle were twelve points clear of United, they finished four points short of United. United scored eight goals and conceeded none in their last two Premiership games, they were worthy Champions for the third time in four seasons.
United, after embarrasing defeats in the UEFA Cup and Coca Cola Cups, to Rotor Volvograd and York City respectively, were determined to have a good run in the FA Cup, they managed their third consecutive appearance in the final against Liverpool. United had struggled in two league games against the Anfield outfit, but were the better team at Wembley and managed a 1-0 victory thanks to another wonder-strike by Eric Cantona in the 85th minute.
United had won the 'double double', Alex Ferguson had proved even the most loyal fans wrong and Eric Cantona had excorcised the ghosts of Selhurst Park. Ooh Aah!
