The sound! Forty-five thousand people and a hundred and twelve years compressed into one moment, one man, one trophy. A release that they would hear in their memories for the rest of their lives.
Confetti erupted! Red and blue with Green and Gold mixed in! The Wembley sky filling with colour. Dann was standing at the top of the steps with the trophy above his head and tears running down his face and his mouth open in a scream that was not a word but was everything.
The squad rushed up. Sakho first, because Sakho was always first. Then Neves, then Kovačić, then Zaha, then everyone, the players crowding the Royal Box steps, their hands reaching for the trophy, their voices lost in the noise, their faces lit by the floodlights and the confetti and the flashbulbs of ten thousand phones in the Palace end.
They brought the trophy back to the pitch. The lap of honour.
