The history of Wembley is measured above all by its pageant of football - and especially by its F.A. Cup Finals, always the same but always different.  As the late, but great, Bill Shankly once said "Winning the cup here, in this place, is the greatest thrill of all.  You thank God, twice, y'know, I met the old King here.  The crowd, the pomp, me in my best suit. The elation can't be described." That was Shanks' own special memory: and no two people recall any final in quite the same way.  The ritual is constant but there is no script to rehearse and the drama is never pre-ordained.  Every final is full of a thousand flickering images and, good and bad, they are all off the cuff.

Some finals are instantly identified by a single catch-phrase - the "White Horse Final", "The Matthews' Final" and, just after the Hillsborough disaster, the "Requiem Final" between Liverpool and Everton. Other descriptions have been quietly forgotten.  Who now remembers that the poor final of 1960 between Wolves and Blackburn was described as the 'Dustbin Final'.  Extract from the Year 2000 F.A Cup Final Programme from Byron Butler