Blue beats Red in FA Cup

Everton’s Phil Jagielka celebrates after scoring the winning penalty during the shoot out against Manchester United during their FA Cup semi-final soccer match at Wembley Stadium, London.

On April 18, Chelsea vs. Arsenal, Didier Drogba took Chelsea into the FA Cup Final with a finish that was further evidence of his renaissance under Guus Hiddink’s management.

With six minutes left, Drogba accelerated on to a through ball from Frank Lampard and shrugged off the labored attempt of Arsenal central defender Mikael Silvestre to bring his surge to a halt.

And as goalkeeper Lukas Fabian ski came out to make his attempt to halt Drogba’s progress, the Ivory Coast star took it round him and slid home the winner. It was perhaps ft-ting that Drogba should get the vital goal. Any good fortune seemed to be going the way of Arsenal and they had the most fortunate of escapes in the 69th minute.

Silvestre contested possession in the area with Drogba and it seemed he had mis- judged the bounce of the ball. Clearly fearful that Drogba would be through on goal, Silvestre dangled out his left hand to deny the Ivory Coast star and it was an offence missed by referee Martin Atkinson and his assistant. The normally reserved Hiddink was so enraged he indulged in a lengthy and untypical protest at the failure to be awarded a spot-kick. Chelsea had responded in emphatic fashion to the concession of an 18th-minute goal from Theo Walcott, who had driven the ball home after a cross from Kieran Gibbs. Within 15 minutes they were level when Florent Malouda controlled a long ball from Lampard and cut inside to hammer past Fabian ski at the neat post.

 Nicolas Anelka had hit the post with another great effort as Chelsea took command.

This was the day when something had to give. Chelsea manager Hiddink is known as “Lucky Guus” back in his native Holland.

 Good fortune, it seems, follows him around. No argument from supporters of Liverpool there.

 In the red corner at Wembley were the teams who have had to live with the tag of “Lucky Arsenal” for more than half a century.

 On April 18, Manchester United vs. Everton, after 90 minutes, neither could score any. Even with extended 30 minutes, the result was the same. As a result of penalty kicks, Tim Howard has stopped two to give Everton a 4-2 shootout victory over Manchester United and its first FA Cup fnal appearance in 14 years.

Newton (7) runs to acclaim Blake’s goal.

The teams had drawn 0-0 through extra time at Wembley on Sunday before the American goalkeeper blocked shots from Dimitar Berbatov and Rio Ferdinand to help put Everton into next month’s fnal against Chelsea.

Defender Phil Jagielka then scored the winning kick, with only Tim Cahill missing for Everton. A United team mostly composed of reserves had been marginally the better side through regular time, but needed goalkeeper Ben Foster to stop an extra time shot to the far post by Cahill.

This defeat immediately crushes he dream of Red Devil to take home he fifth time championship.

 The final match will be held on May 30, at Wembley.

Wolves are ensured they would be playing Premier League football next season.

Wolves will play in the Premier League for the first time in five years after Saturday’s 1-0 win over Queens Park Rangers sealed promotion from the Championship.

Mick McCarthy’s side have held one of the two automatic promotion places since the third match of the season and they finally crossed the finish line with two games to play.

 It was leading scorer Sylvan Ebanks-Blake, a former Manchester United trainee, who got the goal that sent Wolves up in front of a sell-out 27,000 crowd at Molineux.