Manchester United, qualified on Saturday, were joined on Sunday by City, and Londoners from Arsenal and Chelsea in the final four of the FA Cup, whose semi-finals will take place at Wembley on 18 and 19 July. Carried out at halftime of the last quarterfinal between Newcastle and Manchester City, the draw decided that the Red Devils will play Chelsea, while the Gunners will challenge the Citizens, defending champions.
City is always hungry
After the loss of their double title of champion Thursday, in favor of Liverpool, following their defeat at Chelsea (2-1), Manchester City reacted well by eliminating Newcastle.
A match in two very different periods, since the Magpies first tried to make the back round 30 meters from their goal by counting on the liveliness of an Allan Saint-Maximin to hurt against. But they almost never crossed the halfway line and did not prevent Pep Guardiola’s men from scoring by Kevin de Bruyne, who transformed a penalty for his 29th birthday (1-0, 37th).
In the second period, Newcastle tried to react by taking the game on its own and Dwight Gayle missed a huge opportunity to equalize by sending in the clouds an offering of Saint-Maximin, six meters (66th). Two minutes later, Raheem Sterling broke a nice curling shot (0-2, 68) for a controlled victory.
Chelsea depresses Leicester
Returning to three lengths from Leicester in the league, in the podium race, the men of Frank Lampard dealt him another blow in morale with this elimination. The Foxes, already eliminated in the semifinals of the League Cup by a relegation, Aston Villa, in January, experienced a new disillusionment by missing the qualification for their first semi-final of Cup since 1982.
Deprived of their leader, James Maddison, spared, the men of Brendan Rodgers have only too rarely threatened the Londoners, who gradually took the measure of the match and could have led to the break in a beautiful parade by Kasper Schmeichel on a strike powerful of Christian Pulisic in the area (30th).
Lampard took advantage of the break and the regulation temporarily authorizing 5 changes to make three at the break. Winning poker since one of the entrants, Ross Barkley, scored the decisive goal on a center of Willian shortly after the hour of play (1-0, 63rd).
Arsenal by the small door
If the way of Europe seems blocked for the Gunners on the league side, with nine points behind Wolverhampton, 5th, despite a late match, the latter are only two matches away from Europe via the Cup.
Without Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, left on the bench, nor Matteo Guendouzi, still dismissed by Mikel Arteta, Nicolas Pépé assured the main by transforming a penalty awarded after recourse to VAR (1-0, 25th). The video assistants also played an important role by rightly refusing two goals to the premises for offside (10th and 58th).
The Blades could have equalized at the start of the second period (55th, 58th). But they had to wait for yet another defensive error this season from the Gunners to get there. On a long touch, Sead Kolasinac released his teammate Shkodran Mustafi, the ball reaching the attacker David McGoldrick who equalized acrobatically (1-1, 87th).
But the relief from this goal caused a fatal relaxation, since three minutes later, Real Madrid midfielder Dani Ceballos, left free by the defense of Sheffield, sank into the area to deceive closely Henderson (2-1, 90th +1) and allow his team to dream again.
AFP
Created: 28.06.2020, 22h07
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