1995/96 Premier League season review

Manchester United won the 1995/96 Premier League with 82 points, four ahead of a Newcastle side that had led by 12 points in January. Six days later they beat Liverpool 1-0 in the FA Cup final and became the first club to win the Double twice, with a team built around Eric Cantona and a group of young players who had been written off on the opening day.

It was the first Premier League season with 20 clubs, down from 22, so each side played 38 games. Alan Shearer was the top scorer with 31 league goals for Blackburn.

You can replay the season here with a £100m squad picked from 335 players across all 20 clubs, or read on for how it unfolded.

The summer of 1995: Bergkamp, Gullit and a British record

The summer before the season brought some of the biggest names yet to the Premier League. Arsenal, under new manager Bruce Rioch, paid Inter a British record £7.5m for Dennis Bergkamp and signed David Platt from Sampdoria. The record didn't last: Liverpool paid Nottingham Forest £8.5m for Stan Collymore the same month.

Ruud Gullit joined Glenn Hoddle's Chelsea on a free transfer from Sampdoria, and Mark Hughes followed from Manchester United. Newcastle spent around £16m on Les Ferdinand from QPR, David Ginola from Paris Saint-Germain, Warren Barton and Shaka Hislop. Manchester City appointed Alan Ball and signed Georgi Kinkladze from Dinamo Tbilisi.

Middlesbrough, newly promoted, moved into the Riverside Stadium and signed Nick Barmby. In October they added Juninho from São Paulo for £4.75m.

Manchester United went the other way. Paul Ince left for Inter, Hughes for Chelsea and Andrei Kanchelskis for Everton, and Alex Ferguson gave regular places to Nicky Butt, David Beckham, Paul Scholes and Gary and Phil Neville.

The league itself shrank from 22 clubs to 20, so only two sides came up: Middlesbrough and Bolton Wanderers. Blackburn, the champions, began their defence under Ray Harford, with Kenny Dalglish moving upstairs to director of football.

How Newcastle's 12-point lead slipped away

United's season started badly. They lost 3-1 at Aston Villa on 19 August 1995, and Alan Hansen said afterwards that "you can't win anything with kids".

Eric Cantona returned from his eight-month suspension on 1 October and scored a penalty in a 2-2 draw with Liverpool at Old Trafford. Even so, Kevin Keegan's Newcastle set the pace through the autumn, with Les Ferdinand scoring and David Ginola supplying from the left.

Newcastle were 10 points clear when they went to Old Trafford on 27 December. United won 2-0 and beat QPR two days later to cut the gap to four. Then United lost 4-1 at Tottenham on New Year's Day and drew with Aston Villa, and by 20 January 1996 Newcastle's lead was 12 points. In February they added Faustino Asprilla and David Batty for around £11m.

The turning point came on 4 March at St James' Park. Cantona scored the only goal in the second half, and the gap was down to one point. United went top in mid-March and stayed there.

Newcastle's spring was defined by away defeats at Arsenal, Liverpool and Blackburn. The game at Anfield on 3 April finished 4-3:

• Robbie Fowler put Liverpool ahead in the second minute.
• Ferdinand and Ginola turned it round, and Newcastle led 2-1 at half-time.
• Fowler equalised, Asprilla restored the lead, and Stan Collymore made it 3-3.
• Collymore scored the winner in stoppage time.

In 2003 the Premier League's 10 Seasons Awards named it Match of the Decade.

The pressure showed on 29 April. Newcastle had just won 1-0 at Leeds, and Alex Ferguson had suggested that Leeds and Nottingham Forest would try less hard against Newcastle than against United. Live on Sky, Keegan replied that he would "love it if we beat them". Newcastle drew 1-1 at Forest three days later.

On the final day, 5 May, Newcastle drew 1-1 with Tottenham while United won 3-0 at Middlesbrough, with goals from David May, Andy Cole and Ryan Giggs. On 11 May Cantona's 86th-minute goal beat Liverpool in the FA Cup final, and United had the Double.

Cantona scored 14 league goals and was named Footballer of the Year by the football writers. Ferguson was Manager of the Season, and Peter Schmeichel kept 18 league clean sheets, the most of any keeper. Newcastle finished on 78 points, and Ferdinand, with 25 league goals, was the PFA Players' Player of the Year.

Liverpool, Villa and the race for Europe

Behind the top two, five clubs finished within ten points of each other:

• Liverpool were third on 71 points and went 15 league games unbeaten, the longest run of the season. Robbie Fowler scored 28 league goals and was PFA Young Player of the Year. Losing the FA Cup final still earned them a Cup Winners' Cup place, because United were already in the Champions League.
• Aston Villa were fourth on 63 points and won the League Cup, beating Leeds 3-0 at Wembley on 24 March. Dwight Yorke scored 17 league goals and added the third goal in the final.
• Arsenal finished fifth on the same points as Villa, with Ian Wright scoring 15 in Bergkamp's first season. Newcastle, Villa and Arsenal took the three UEFA Cup places.
• Everton were sixth, with Andrei Kanchelskis scoring 15 league goals after his move from Old Trafford.
• Blackburn, the champions, finished seventh, the lowest finish by a title holder at that point. They won one of their six Champions League group games, and sold David Batty to Newcastle in February. Shearer still scored 31 league goals, and they beat Nottingham Forest 7-0 in November, the biggest home win of the season.

Relegation: Manchester City go down on goal difference

Three clubs went down:

• Bolton Wanderers, back in the top flight for the first time in 15 years, finished bottom with 29 points. Roy McFarland was sacked on 2 January with the club 20th, and Colin Todd took over.
• Queens Park Rangers went down in 19th with 33 points, in their first season without Les Ferdinand.
• Manchester City failed to win any of their first 11 league games under Alan Ball. A 2-2 draw with Liverpool on the final day left them level on 38 points with Coventry and Southampton, but City's goal difference was seven worse and they went down after seven years in the top flight.

Surprises, disappointments and records

Some of the season's best stories came from outside the title race:

• Middlesbrough lost only one of their first 10 games in their new stadium and were fourth in late October, with Juninho newly arrived from Brazil. An eight-match losing run followed, and they finished 12th, five points clear of the drop.
• Ruud Gullit made the PFA Team of the Year in his first season in England, although Chelsea finished 11th.
• Tony Yeboah scored two spectacular volleys for Leeds, against Liverpool in August and Wimbledon in September.
• Stan Collymore scored 14 league goals after his record move, including the winner in the 4-3 against Newcastle.

Others struggled. Coventry and Wimbledon each went 14 league games without a win, the longest run of the season, though both stayed up. Coventry survived on goal difference, helped by 14 league goals from Dion Dublin. At Blackburn, Chris Sutton made 13 league appearances without scoring. Manchester City and Middlesbrough each lost eight in a row.

The season's records:

• Biggest away win: Bolton 0-6 Manchester United, 25 February 1996.
• Highest-scoring game: Sheffield Wednesday 6-2 Leeds United, 16 December 1995.
• Biggest crowd: 53,926 for Manchester United 5-0 Nottingham Forest on 28 April 1996. The smallest was 6,352, for Wimbledon against Sheffield Wednesday on 30 August 1995.
• Goals: 988 in 380 games, 2.6 a game.

The PFA Team of the Year

The players' Team of the Year had three Newcastle players and only one from the champions, Gary Neville. Cantona, the football writers' Footballer of the Year, was left out.

The season's other awards:

• PFA Players' Player of the Year: Les Ferdinand
• PFA Young Player of the Year: Robbie Fowler
• FWA Footballer of the Year: Eric Cantona
• Manager of the Season: Alex Ferguson

1995/96 quick answers

Who won the Premier League in 1995/96? Manchester United, with 82 points, four ahead of Newcastle.

How big was Newcastle's lead? 12 points, on 20 January 1996.

Who was relegated in 1995/96? Manchester City, Queens Park Rangers and Bolton Wanderers.

Who was the Premier League top scorer in 1995/96? Alan Shearer, with 31 league goals for Blackburn.

Who was PFA Player of the Year in 1995/96? Les Ferdinand. Robbie Fowler was Young Player of the Year.

Who won the FA Cup in 1996? Manchester United, who beat Liverpool 1-0 with a late Cantona goal to complete the Double.

How many teams were in the Premier League in 1995/96? 20, down from 22, so each club played 38 games.