FA Cup final 2011 - City end long victory drought

MANCHESTER CITY’s 35 year trophy drought ended yesterday, as they beat Stoke City 1-0 in the FA Cup final at Wembley.  City’s semi-final hero Yaya Toure scored the only goal in the 74^th minute to break Stoke’s resistance in an intriguing final, though hardly a classic to be remembered.

     Stoke were taking part in their first ever FA Cup final, whilst City last made it this far back in 1981.  Therefore, it was a surprising final for many and unfortunately, the game never lived up to its pre-match billing.  Tony Pulis side were very poor in the first half and thanks to some great goalkeeping from Thomas Sorensen and wasteful City finishing, they held onto a 0-0 scoreline at half-time.  Both Carlos Tevez and man-of-the-match Mario Balotelli were denied by the exploits of Sorensen, who has been Stoke’s FA Cup goalkeeper all season.  The Potters were organised and very resolute, but sadly, not much more.  The best chance of the first half was missed by the off-colour David Silva.  Balotelli’s brilliant movement ten minutes before half-time set the chance up and although the Spanish World Cup winner approached it at an awkward height, he basically missed a sitter by his high standards. 

     At times, the final threatened to get out of hand into a very bitty occasion.  Two poor challenges from Robert Huth in the first half meant the German was very lucky to stay on the pitch by half-time.  Either side of the interval and Jermaine Pennant was the victim of two bruising challenges, which limited his impact.  With Matthew Etherington forced off on the hour mark, having picked up a recurrence of the hamstring injury that he first picked up against Wolves 18 days ago, Stoke’s threat, particularly on the wings was severely limited.  Toure went onto to make the right headlines, but even the Ivorian was lucky to still be on the field by the time he scored the decisive goal.  A very bad challenge on Andy Wilkinson which looked malicious and with some form of intent was the climax of a very scrappy and spicy start to the second half. 

CHANCE: Stoke's golden chance was blown by Kenwyne Jones

     Stoke’s best chance to win the FA Cup final came just before Etherington’s enforced departure.  His beautifully-flighted ball over the top found Kenwyne Jones.  Jones managed to escape the clutches of Joleon Lescott, but Joe Hart stood tall, and made a critical save.  At this point, Roberto Mancini elected to make a bold move.  He sacrificed one of his holding players; Gareth Barry, for the more attack-minded Adam Johnson and the extra aggression in the final third soon paid dividends.  Yet again, Balotelli was in the heart of the move.  His shot, after some clever skill was blocked by Ryan Shawcross and following another minor deflection, the ball fell perfectly to Toure, who produced a cracking drive to break the deadlock.  It was a strike that left Sorensen with absolutely no chance.  Despite sending Shawcross forward as an emergency striker and Sorensen for corners, Stoke’s late bombardment on the City goal ultimately came to nothing.

    The rise of Manchester City continues and it is a fitting tribute to Neil Young.  Young, who scored the winning goal the last time the blue side of Manchester won the FA Cup, in 1969, died in February.  Goalkeeper Hart insisted that Manchester United’s earlier title success at Ewood Park meant nothing to hinder the celebrations; “We don’t care about Man U.  This is about Man City and the players and the fans, we deserved to win.”  Losing manager Pulis accepted the result with good grace.  He told ITV; “We’ve had a great season, but ultimately we dropped off today.  The best side won.” 

ALOFT: Tevez lifts the FA Cup for Manchester City

      The 1976 League Cup was the last time Manchester City lifted a major domestic trophy and on the week when they also won qualification into next season’s Champions League, this will go down as a week to remember for all City fans.  Ultimately, they were the stronger and better outfit throughout and deserved the win.  It was left to Carlos Tevez, only the third overseas captain after Eric Cantona and Patrick Vieira to lift the FA Cup aloft.  Whilst Stoke played their part in a largely forgettable final, it was a Blue Day at Wembley yesterday and anything is possible from here for the rich-spenders.  This could be the start of something big and there is no doubt now, that the whole of the football world must sit-up and take notice. 

FA Barclays Premiership Report (11th - 13th September 2010)

After the international break, the FA Premier League returned and served up one of the all-time classics on Saturday lunchtime, and an England hopeful seeing his dreams crushed by an unlucky and cruel injury.

Saturday 11^th September: Everton 3-3 Manchester United

For the second time this season, Manchester United threw away a winning advantage in the dying seconds, this time at the hands of Everton, after a masterpiece of a match on Merseyside.  Despite falling behind to a goal from Steven Pienaar, United charged into a 3-1 lead, largely down to clinical defending and a nightmare outing from the dopey Sylvain Distin.  Darren Fletcher levelled the scores before half-time, stealing infront of Distin from close range, before Nemanja Vidic pounced unmarked, then Dimitar Berbatov robbed Distin to continue his rich vein of scoring form.  Entering stoppage time, United were cruising, but got sloppy and conceded injury-time efforts from Tim Cahill’s header and Mikel Arteta’s deflected shot.  It was the first time United chucked away a two-goal lead in ten years in the Premiership and with Wayne Rooney having been pulled out of the match by Sir Alex Ferguson; everyone could talk about the match and not headlines off-the-pitch.

Saturday 11^th September: Newcastle United 0-2 Blackpool

Blackpool leapt into the Champions League positions, after an impressive away win at St. James’s Park against a very disappointing Newcastle United.  It was Newcastle’s first home defeat in sixteen months and their impressive unbeaten record fell as flat as a pancake.  Charlie Adam converted a stoppage time penalty and then deadline day signing DJ Campbell struck home a crispy driven strike in the dying stages on the counter-attack.  Blackpool’s win was dedicated to their youth coach Gary Parkinson, who collapsed with a stroke on Friday night.

Saturday 11^th September: West Ham United 1-3 Chelsea

Chelsea maintained their 100% record and inflicted a fourth successive defeat on West Ham United and Avram Grant.  Two headed goals from Michael Essien set the benchmark for the champions, who rarely were troubled.  Salomon Kalou scored the other goal for the Blues, pouncing on another error from calamity Robert Green in the Hammers goal.  Scott Parker scored a late consolation, before Frederic Piquionne somehow hit the crossbar from one yard out in time added on. 

Saturday 11^th September: Arsenal 4-1 Bolton Wanderers

Arsenal held onto their unbeaten record, with a typical, starring performance, with a bit of help from the referee against Bolton Wanderers.  Laurent Koscieny tapped in after a scrappy build-up, but Johan Elmander took full advantage of a defensive mix-up involving Koscieny and Sebastian Squillaci to draw Bolton level on the stroke of half-time.  Marouane Chamakh had the Gunners back infront early in the second half, before Stuart Attwell sent off Gary Cahill for a late challenge that only merited a yellow card.  Afterwards, Arsene Wenger’s side picked off Wanderers, with Alex Song scoring the 1000^th goal of the Wenger reign before Carlos Vela finished off a picture book 25-pass move with a cool finish eight minutes from time. 

Monday 13^th September: Stoke City 2-1 Aston Villa

Stoke City earned their first points of the season, with a hard-fought and deserved 2-1 success over inconsistent Aston Villa last night.  Despite the tragic death of his mother on Monday morning, Tony Pulis turned up on the dugout at the Britannia Stadium in the second half, and his presence turned the fortunes around for the Potters, who were trailing 1-0 at half-time, due to a Stewart Downing header.  The home side dominated the second half, and won the game with two goals in the last ten minutes, courtesy of a header from Kenwyne Jones, his first goal for his new club, then an injury-time winner from German defender Robert Huth.  Kevin MacDonald was still in caretaker charge of the Villains, with new manager Gerard Houillier absent, as his contract with the FFF (French Football Federation) not expiring until September 26^th. 

Saturday 11^th September: Fulham 2-1 Wolves

Fulham collected their first win of the season, but it came at a cost, with a shocking injury to their star striker Bobby Zamora.  Zamora, who signed a new four-year contract on Friday, laid in agony after an altercation with Karl Henry in the 27^th minute.  Henry’s challenge was excellent, and it was the awkward landing that did the damage for the England striker.  Scans revealed that Zamora suffered a broken leg, with ligament damage also showing up.  He will be out of football for the best part of eight months.  By this stage, Fulham were already behind, when Jelle van Damme arrived unmarked on ten minutes to score for the visitors.  New signing Moussa Dembele turned the game around after the break with two goals, his second coming in the 89^th minute.  Wolves’ day turned bleaker as the match went on, with defender Christophe Berra dismissed for two daft yellow cards.

Saturday 11^th September: West Brom 1-1 Tottenham Hotspur

The 50^th goal of Chris Brunt’s league career was enough for West Brom to earn a deserved draw against Tottenham Hotspur.  Spurs gave debuts to William Gallas and Rafael van der Vaart, and went ahead early on through Luka Modric.  By half-time though, Harry Redknapp’s side were on the backfoot, with Modric leaving the Hawthorns on crutches and Brunt levelling the scores after Spurs failed to clear Marc-Antoine Fortune’s looping cross. 

Sunday 12^th September: Birmingham City 0-0 Liverpool

Liverpool had Pepe Reina to thank for, as they battled to a fortuitous point against a far better Birmingham side at St. Andrews.  The Spanish goalkeeper produced two stunning saves in the first half, to deny Cameron Jerome and Craig Gardner.  Missing Dirk Kuyt through injury and with Fernando Torres still nowhere near his best, Roy Hodgson’s side showed a lack of creativity and will be relieved to escape the Midlands with another point on the board.

Saturday 11^th September: Manchester City 1-1 Blackburn Rovers

Despite their dominance, Manchester City failed to secure the three points against a hard-working Blackburn Rovers at the City of Manchester stadium.  Nikola Kallinic pounced on a dreadful miscommunication between Joe Hart and Kolo Toure to score his second goal of the season, once again from a goalkeeping blunder.  Despite Patrick Vieira rolling back the years with a fine equaliser early in the second half, Roberto Mancini will be frustrated by his team’s failure to convert their opportunities into goals.  This was definitely two points dropped by the multi-millionaires.

Saturday 11^th September: Wigan Athletic 1-1 Sunderland

Asamoah Gyan began repaying the £13million that Sunderland spent on him on deadline day, with the Ghanaian coming off the bench to earn Steve Bruce’s side a share of the spoils at the DW Stadium.  Sunderland were on the backfoot, once Lee Cattermole was sent off for the second time already this season, following two rash tackles inside 27 minutes.  Gyan came on for Danny Wellbeck at half-time and within fifteen minutes, powered the Black Cats ahead from Jordan Henderson’s cross.  They were denied the three points by a late scrambled equaliser from Wigan centre-back Antolin Alcaraz.