Manchester United claim FA Cup revenge over Chelsea.

Manchester United claim FA Cup revenge over Chelsea.

In the end revenge was indeed sweet for Manchester United. That now far off day in last year's FA Cup Final now seems like some very bad dream for Manchester United. Chelsea beat United 1-0 of course, but history can play tricks with the mind and for Manchester United this must have been just an optical illusion which didn't really happen. Now the roles had been reversed and this time it was Manchester United who gave Chelsea a bitter gulp of their own medicine.

Chelsea were knocked out of this year's FA Cup and now face the rest of the season like somebody in a bewildered trance, neither here nor there. True, they do have one straw of the Carabao Cup to cling onto but this is rather like telling a lost child that help won't be forthcoming until the following morning. Poor Chelsea looked like a team chasing a tangled ball of cotton wool. This was one forlorn cause too far for Chelsea and the grumbling growlers among the Stamford Bridge faithful are in gallows humour mood.

Last night Chelsea reminded you, particularly in the second half, of a roller coaster dipping and swooping thrillingly before grinding to a halt when all the fun had gone. For almost the whole of the second half , Chelsea circled and surrounded Manchester United like the local police cordoning off a neighbourhood in the hope that the hardened criminal will eventually come out with their hands in the air.

But for the first half of this heavyweight contest between these famous football cruiserweights it was Manchester United who held the superior upper hand. It's hard to believe that since caretaker manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer took over from the not so lamented Jose Mourinho, |United have turned into quite the most astonishingly unbeatable side who, apart from the Champions League setback recently, are still on fire, a fusion of the brilliant and at times almost breathtaking.

With Sir Alex Ferguson watching on from high, this was a Manchester United made in a remarkably similar mould. Against Chelsea, United snuffed out and stifled their hosts with a wonderful display of defensive discipline and superb self preservation that left Chelsea in a drunken stupor. Every time a blue army of Chelsea players started playing and then over thinking with the ball, United brought down the red curtain. This was an exercise in containment on quite the most heroic scale.

For all of Chelsea's patient, methodical and pretty passing triangles, the ball invariably ran out of space and a red United shirt was waiting to snatch and grab. Chelsea, for their part, after going two goals down in the first half, did look as though the second half  would be the ultimate challenge they would meet successfully.

The likes of Jorginho, N'Golo Kante, Marcus Alonso, Mateo Kovacic and Antonio Rudiger swung the ball around with firmly accurate passes in diamond formations. But then the attacking movements would end up in a draughty courtyard or a frustrating cul de sac. Slowly but surely Chelsea began to run out of ideas with a distressing regularity. Now United could smell the sweetest fragrance of victory in their noses.

Suddenly United re- discovered the pace, the energy and the urgency that had been so sorely missing under Mourinho. Now it was one player who, now securely fixed in the England team, emerged as, quite possibly, the man of the match. Once again Marcus Rashford, United's tall and willowy striker  stole the show for the red shirts of Manchester United. Rashford is now in his youthful prime and at frequent intervals showed an almost scintillating turn of pace and athleticism that ran Chelsea ragged.

From a broken Chelsea attack, Rashford once picked the ball up in his own half and ran like the wind. It was quite the most stunning cameo of this whole FA Cup match. In the space of a couple of seconds Rashford was off like a whippet, reminiscent of  a hare at a greyhound track, sprinting powerfully through a crumbling Chelsea defence and leaving a string of blue Chelsea shirts gasping for air. On this occasion Rashford was unsuccessful in his endeavours but there were times when Chelsea must have thought they were chasing a red cheetah.

Back in the first half United took the lead and shocked the life out of a Chelsea side who have recently been walking a tightrope with no safety net to catch them. Chris Smalling and Luke Shaw were mopping up comfortably at the back, stalking the Chelsea front line and then hustling the blue shirts out of their stride. Victor Lindelof and Ander Herrera were manoeuvring the ball into dangerous areas, Ashley Young, although now at the veteran stage of his career, was still laying off simple passes into open spaces and Paul Pogba was just upright and domineering as if he was the leader of the pack and nobody else.

So it was that on the half way line that United tricked their way cunningly into the Chelsea half. Juan Mata, still lively and visionary as ever, picked an intricate path into the Chelsea half with a series of quick one twos, flicking the ball neatly in between a cluster of Chelsea players. Then a lightning quick break found Paul Pogba tearing down the flank and the French maestro checked the ball back onto his favoured foot before clipping a cross for the onrushing Ander Herrera who  headed the ball cleverly past the Chelsea keeper Kepa Arrizabalaga.

Moments before half time of this uplifting FA Cup fifth round tie, United piled on the agony and rendered Chelsea's task impossible. After Chelsea had once again fumbled possession in the wrong parts of the pitch. United somehow won the ball back from a series of clumsy headers which were going nowhere and then that man Rashford turned on the afterburners near the touchline. His splendidly weighted and floated cross was perfectly directed for Pogba whose tremendous header flew past the Chelsea keeper for United's second goal.

The second half was largely uneventful with Chelsea huffing and puffing, straining and testing the United defence to the limit. But United were resolute, admirably composed, never flinching from important interceptions and tackles and always following every blue shirt with eagle eyed vigilance. By the time the referee had blown for full time Chelsea were out on their feet quite literally. Even Eden Hazard, surely one of the most intelligent players in Europe, kept running into red brick walls, threatening as always but never quite finding the right key

And so it is that Manchester United go through to the quarter finals of the FA Cup where their opponents will be high flying Wolves, now transformed under their likeable manager Espirito. Maybe United's season will have a happy ending after the traumas experienced under Jose Mourinho. The ball remains favourably in their court and who knows where their season may be taking them now?

As for Chelsea this is not the way the script was intended to pan out. Our Italian friend Maurizio Sarri looked extremely puzzled and stressed out at times. You fear the worst for him. The Chelsea board  are not renowned for their tolerance at the best of times and the chairman looks like one of those quiet assassins who always have unsavoury plans at the back of his mind.

Chelsea only have Manchester City at the Carabao Cup Final for any chance of silverware and at the moment at least that seems like wishful thinking. Sarri isn't quite a condemned man but it doesn't look good for our friendly former bank manager. The natives are restless in West London and the paying season ticket holders who patronise the harbour and village at Chelsea may want to look away now. Sarri ball is beginning to look like sorry ball at the moment. It would be interesting to be a fly on the wall of Roman Abramovich's office. Russian roulette was never the most appealing of games and Chelsea may be thinking that Sarri was too much of a calculated gamble. Next Chelsea manager please.