STOKE City and Manchester City will contest this season’s FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium next month. This is after the pair overcame Bolton Wanderers and Manchester United in two interesting semi-finals at the home of English football at the weekend.
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| MOBBED: City players pile on Yaya Toure, after his winner |
Manchester City’s pain of not winning coveted silverware for so long could well be over and they managed to overcome bitter rivals Manchester United 1-0 in the first semi on Saturday evening. Roberto Mancini’s side fully deserved to advance to the final, ending United’s treble dreams in the process. The only goal of the game came ten minutes into the second half. Michael Carrick made a crucial error and was intercepted by the bullish Yaya Toure. Toure went on to brush off Nemanja Vidic and beat the advancing Edwin van der Sar to ink his name in City folklore forever. It was another high-profile mistake from error-strewn Carrick, who despite having a better season this campaign, has the tendency to slip up at the critical moment. As the game wore on, United’s desperation increased, clearly missing the suspended Wayne Rooney. His replacement, Dimitar Berbatov had an off-day – missing two early chances for Sir Alex Ferguson’s side. They came within 20 seconds of one another. The first forced a good save from Joe Hart, whilst the second was a chance his grandmother could have scored with her eyes shut! How the Premier League’s top goalscorer missed with a gaping goal at his mercy, two yards out is enough to destroy anyone’s self-belief. After the break, only a Nani free-kick forced Hart into some serious action as United toiled. Paul Scholes was rightfully dismissed on 72 minutes. His crude challenge on Pablo Zabaleta punished with a straight red card from referee Mike Dean. Although an ugly confrontation between Rio Ferdinand and Mario Balotelli slightly marred the post-match celebrations of City, few can begrudge their supporters of an FA Cup final, despite the club’s enhanced wealth of recent seasons.
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| CLINCHER: Kenwyne Jones beats Jaaseklainen to end the contest |
Their opponents on the big day will be Stoke City, who thrashed Bolton Wanderers on Sunday afternoon 5-0. The impressive Jonathan Walters scored twice to seal the Potters first ever FA Cup final appearance. Owen Coyle was close to tears; struggling to take in just how poor his side had been. Bolton choked on the big stage and this made it a trouble-free and delightful afternoon for Tony Pulis’s team, who recorded one of the biggest ever Wembley thrashings. Matthew Etherington punished careless possession from Johan Elmander to hit an unstoppable drive past Juusi Jaaskelainen in the 11th minute. Moments later, Robert Huth doubled the lead, although Jaaskelainen might feel he could have done better with his shot. As a contest, the game was well and truly over on the half hour mark, once Kenwyne Jones made it 3-0. Bolton’s fans started deserting in their drones, unable to witness such a spanking. Walters added the gloss with his two strikes in a man of the match performance after the interval. Congratulations to both Stoke and Manchester City, hope you give us a wonderful final.
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