Newly promoted Crystal Palace lost on the opening day at Queens Park Rangers and at home to Coventry City in their third match.

Sandwiched between had been a credible point at home to Manchester United, with a late Ian Wright equaliser cancelling out Bryan Robson's first-half goal.

In the meantime, Crystal Palace won their fourth game of the season at home to Wimbledon and Liverpool comfortably beat Derby County 3–0 at the Baseball Ground.

Liverpool opened the scoring in the 7th minute – John Barnes dribbled towards the Crystal Palace area, but found himself blocked before Ronnie Whelan played a pass out to the right, from where Steve Nicol finished coolly.

Four days later they played Norwich City at Anfield but the match was an anticlimactic goalless draw with Peter Beardsley and Glenn Hysén each missing an open goal.

[2] Palace survived relegation, finishing 15th, and were able to inflict revenge on Liverpool later in the season, beating them 4–3 in an FA Cup semi-final at Villa Park.

Their goalkeeper Perry Suckling's career never quite recovered from conceding nine – he soon lost his place to new signing Nigel Martyn, and left the club in 1992, joining Watford (where he replaced a Liverpool-bound David James), before drifting into lower- and non-league football.