FA Cup
ODION IGHALO PROPELS MAN UNITED TO FA CUP SEMI FINALS
Odion Ighalo Saturday night laid the foundation, which Harry Maguire built on to propel Manchester to the FA Cup semi finals after a hard-fought battle against Norwich.
Manchester United won 2-1 following an Odion Ighalo opener and Maguire’s second goal almost at the end of extra time after Todd Cantwell’s equalizer 15 minutes to regulation time.
Great Ighalo! He has now scored in each of his four Manchester United starts, making it five goals in 11 appearances since he arrived from Shanghai Shenhua in January.
Norwich, playing their first quarter finals match since 1992 really stretched Manchester United almost to breaking poin.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side had to work hard for their place in the last four as Todd Cantwell forced extra time by cancelling out Odion Ighalo’s opener at Carrow Road.
Norwich defender Timm Klose was sent off for hauling down Ighalo in the 89th minute and that eventually tipped the balance in United’s favour.
They gradually wore Norwich down and England defender Maguire pounced to extend their unbeaten run to 14 games in all competitions.
United, who won their 12th and most recent FA Cup in 2016, remain on course to reach the final for the second time in three years.
Exactly 114 days after United won at Derby in the fifth round on March 5, the FA Cup returned following the coronavirus hiatus with the competition’s first ever match in June.
Solskjaer made eight changes as only Maguire, Luke Shaw and Bruno Fernandes survived from the midweek Premier League win against Sheffield United.
United’s stand-ins were out of sync for much of a first half that followed the pattern of many post-lockdown matches, both teams lacking energy and invention.
In a rare threat, Maguire had to stop Lukas Rupp’s shot with an alert block after Cantwell’s run opened up the visitors’ defence.
Solskjaer’s team finally awoke from their slumber after the interval and grabbed the lead in the 51st minute.
Luke Shaw’s cross was helped on by Juan Mata and Ighalo sniffed out the chance, flicking an agile finish past Tim Krul from inside the six-yard box.
FRANTIC FINALE
Norwich were playing in their first FA Cup quarter-final since 1992, but Canaries boss Daniel Farke had dampened the mood when he insisted they had no chance of winning the competition.
Despite Farke’s pessimism, Norwich nearly equalised when Ben Godfrey stretched to reach Alexander Tettey’s header from Emiliano Buendia’s free-kick.
It seemed certain Godfrey would score but instead the defender could only accidently deflect the ball away from the United goal.
Norwich kept pressing and drew level in the 75th minute when Cantwell’s 20-yard strike swerved away from slow-to-react United keeper Sergio Romero.
Suddenly in the ascendency, Norwich almost won it in the final minutes when Buendia shot just past the far post.
But with extra time looming, Fernandes’ superb flick found Ighalo on the edge of the area and Klose’s panicked response, hauling down the Nigerian, triggered a red card from referee Jonathan Moss.
Krul made good saves to keep out efforts from United substitutes Paul Pogba and Mason Greenwood in a frantic finale.
With five subs allowed since the lockdown and an additional one given to teams who go to extra time in the FA Cup, United become the first English side to make six changes in the same game when Anthony Martial replaced Eric Bailly.
United dominated extra time and Marcus Rashford’s strike was pushed over by Krul, who made an even better save to stop Maguire’s header.
Maguire wasn’t to be denied and in the 118th minute United’s pressure finally told as the England defender poked home from close range after Ighalo flicked on.
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola admitted he was surprised that Norwegian striker Erling Haaland declined to take a penalty for his side in Saturday’s FA Cup final against Crystal Palace with the kick subsequently being missed by Omar Marmoush.
Trailing 1-0 to Eberechi Eze’s goal, City were awarded a penalty in the first half when Palace defender Tyrick Mitchell tripped Bernardo Silva who had burst into the area.
Haaland, who had failed to score in his first five Wembley appearances for City, looked poised to break that duck, but handed the ball to Marmoush whose first-ever penalty for City was superbly saved by Dean Henderson.
“I thought he would want to take it but they didn’t speak,” said Guardiola. “That moment for the penalty, it’s the feeling and how they feel. They decided Omar was ready to take it.
“Omar took a lot of time when the ball was stopped, so it put more pressure on him, and Henderson made a good save.”
Former Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney, working as a TV pundit for the BBC, said he felt the occasion might have got to Haaland.
“He’s a world-class forward, but when we are talking about Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, there is no way they are giving that ball away,” Rooney said.
“That is what separates them two players from Erling Haaland or Kylian Mbappe and these players. They are selfish and they want to score every game.
“When (Haaland) misses chances I think you can see it gets to him and it does affect him. Maybe the thought of taking a penalty at Wembley might have been too much for him. You never know, he is a human being.”
Haaland has scored 30 goals for City this season in all competitions but has missed three of his seven penalties.
-Reuters
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Crystal Palace face Manchester City at Wembley on Saturday hoping to lift the FA Cup for the first time and it is guaranteed that high on the pre-match agenda will be the club’s extraordinary and eventually heartbreaking 1990 campaign.
The semi-finals and final(s) that year were arguably the most dramatic in the competition’s long and storied history and remain the emotional high and low point of every Palace fan who watched them.
Palace were struggling in the top flight after promotion and had been humiliated 9-0 by Liverpool early in the season.
In the Cup they were hardly pulling up trees either, beating lower league Portsmouth, Huddersfield Town, Rochdale and Cambridge United to reach the semi-finals for the first time since they lost to Southampton as a third division team in 1976.
Facing runaway champions-elect and FA Cup holders Liverpool again in the semis look an insurmountable barrier and an Ian Rush goal had the Reds ahead at halftime at Villa Park.
Things then went crazy as Mark Bright and Gary O’Reilly gave Palace a shock lead. Two goals in two minutes put Liverpool back in front, only for Andy Gray to stun the odds-on favourites in the 88th minute to force extra time.
Amazingly, it was Palace who snatched victory in the 109th minute via Alan Pardew, who would later manage the club.
It was the first year that both semi-finals were live on TV and barely had the excitement abated when similarly unfancied Oldham ran out to face Manchester United at Maine Road.
The second division team had not beaten top-flight opposition in 66 years but accounted for four that season in a double cup run that caught the nation’s imagination.
Playing vibrant, attacking football under Joe Royle, Oldham twice came from behind to draw 3-3 after extra time – meaning a remarkable 13 goals had been scored on a day of unimaginable drama. United ended Oldham’s dream when they snatched a 2-1 victory six minutes from the end of extra time in the replay.
ALL-ENGLISH TEAM
The Palace side who lined up at Wembley were the last all-English team to play in the final while United’s were the last all-UK lineup to win it.
United manager Alex Ferguson was under huge pressure to deliver a trophy four years after arriving at Old Trafford, but Palace struck first through O’Reilly.
Bryan Robson and Mark Hughes turned it round and United seemed on course for victory, only for Ian Wright to come off the bench for the most wonderful 20 minutes of his life.
The former non-league striker had been sidelined for much of the season with a twice-broken leg, but exploded into action to equalise with virtually his first touch and then put the Londoners ahead early in extra time.
“It’s still the greatest moment I’ve had in my career – easily – simply because of everything that it had entailed up to that point,” Wright told the Palace website on Friday.
“My emergence at Palace, and to reach the biggest stage in English football, and all of a sudden I’m on the Wembley pitch.
“And then what happened after that was the stuff of fairytales. It really, really was.”
However, as the Palace fans sang in dreamland, Hughes broke their hearts with a late equaliser.
The replay five days later could not live up to everything that had gone before and though Palace battled gamely, United won it 1-0 with a goal by Lee Martin.
It was a victory that launched Ferguson and United on their dizzying journey of success – that included another extra-time FA Cup final win over Palace in 2016 after the Scot had retired – but one that left a gaping hole in the hearts of the losers.
“I would have loved to have won that FA Cup, and we were only seven minutes away,” said Wright, who went on to win multiple trophies, including two FA Cups with Arsenal. “Seven minutes. Honestly, I still can’t take it.”
-Reuters
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The first weekend of semi-automated offside decisions in English soccer descended into confusion on Saturday as Bournemouth had a goal ruled out after a record eight-minute VAR check.
Bournemouth, who eventually beat Premier League rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers on penalties in the FA Cup fifth round after a 1-1 draw, thought they had doubled their lead when defender Milos Kerkez scored in the 35th-minute goal.
However, new technology could not be used because the six-yard area was too crowded and VAR officials had to revert to manually drawing lines before disallowing the goal.
Fellow defender Dean Huijsen was adjudged to have been in an offside position as Kerkez’s effort brushed his shoulder before going in to the net.
The VAR check was further complicated as VAR officials Timothy Wood and Darren England also had to also examine the possibility of hand balls prior to the tight offside call.
Both sets of fans voiced their disapproval at the interminable wait, chanting “it’s not football any more” and “this is embarrassing”.
Referee Sam Barrott, who eventually announced the decision to the crowd via a microphone, had to explain to the respective managers and players what was happening during the delay.
-Reuters
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