Arsenal meet Chelsea in another repeat FA Cup Final.

Arsenal meet Chelsea in another repeat FA Cup Final.

Wembley Stadium has never looked stranger or more soul destroyingly emptier. Never has it looked so haggard or withdrawn. There was a grave air of sterility and loneliness about the national stadium that had to be seen to be believed. Wembley had nobody to turn to in its moment of greatest need and you can only feel that one day, when football supporters are finally allowed to flood back through that iconic arch that once again it'll feel very much wanted and loved by those who have regularly passed through its celebrated entrances.

For the time being there was an FA Cup semi-final to be completed and once again this season's FA Cup Final will be a repeat of a previous Cup Final. At times the FA Cup begins to look very predictable and perhaps it would have been nice, in this season of seasons to wrap things up with a novel variation on a theme just to break the monotony of it all. And yet the 2020 FA Cup Final will have yet another London derby between Arsenal and Chelsea so we may have to accept the inevitable because that's the way it is.

Amid all the craziness and wackiness of Project Restart some things never really change though. The FA Cup semi-final almost had to be played by default more than anything else. It was pencilled into football's calendar regardless of the disruption that has now cut into the season with a pair of the sharpest of scissors. But Chelsea almost swatted Manchester United aside contemptuously as if they were never on the same pitch at any time during the game. United's recent run of good Premier League end of season form, after the season's resumption, had now been rudely stalled by a blue juggernaut.

Of course the traditionalists among us still lament the passing of Villa Park or Hillsborough as the once-popular venue for the FA Cup semi final. Now the dreadful Hillsborough tragedy of 1989 when 96 Liverpool supporters lost their lives before the start of the Liverpool- Nottingham Forest semi final placed football in its most sober and chastened perspective. The fact remains though that nobody would ever have thought the day would come when football would have to deal with an equally as serious chapter in its history.

Still, here we were 31 years later gnashing our teeth at quite the most extraordinary spectacle most of us have ever seen. The game's oldest and still highly respected football competition had been reduced to a brass farthing. Here were twenty two footballers slugging it out for the right to appear in an FA Cup Final surrounded by nothing. What we had here was a concrete bowl with haunting echoes, a stadium that once rightly prided itself on those glorious 100,000 attendances on Cup Final day, now just a silent movie made at the height of Chaplin's heyday.

For Chelsea this seemed the perfect culmination to a long and punishing season where the critics who thought new manager Frank Lampard was just a one trick pony were made to eat their words. In his first managerial job at Championship club Derby Lampard had to make do with old rags and loose threads. Now at the end of his first season at the club he graced for so many years an FA Cup Final almost feels like the perfect end to a fairy tale. A victory against Arsenal would probably mean the world to Lampard whose very modest but feisty demeanour has endeared itself to Chelsea fans.

By the end of the first half Chelsea were crowding out and closing down United from every conceivable angle. a tribute to their well drilled defensive unit. They were moving the ball efficiently and stylishly across all areas of the pitch and winning back possession swiftly when they were without it. There was a gentleness and delicacy to some of Chelsea's passing that occasionally took you back to those twilight years of Dave Sexton when Charlie Cooke, Ray Wilkins and Peter Osgood were in charge of proceedings at Stamford Bridge.

Now though Cesar Azpilicueta rampaging down the flank from a very deep position at the heart of Chelsea's defence began to effect the game quite influentially. Kurt Zouma was sturdy and progressive moving forward while Antonio Rudiger who scored Chelsea's final goal, was a persistent menace whenever he had the ball in dangerous areas.

Chelsea were a delight to the eye, a forest of blue shirts tricking and flicking their way through the United defence with a careless rapture. The young backbone of their midfield was very much the template of a side moulded by Dave Sexton but here Reece James was quick witted, lively and mercurial while the Brazilians Jorginho and William are just a gorgeous adornment to any side. With Mason Mount once again promising to bloom into a very watchable English player and Mateo Kovacic providing balance and ballast, Chelsea were neat, clever and, at times almost unplayable.

Chelsea took the lead before United had had time to find their bearings. Willian broke forward down one side of the United defence before dinking the ball lightly back to Azpilicueta whose sharp cut back to the near post found Olivier Giroud who nipped smartly beyond his defender to clip the ball past David De Gea, now wishing that a hole would swallow him up. Chelsea now had a lead they would never relinquish and by the hour mark United were staring into an abyss.

In the second half there were no visible signs of improvement from United and their Norwegian manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer looked so beaten and crestfallen that he must have thought he'd lost a bet rather than a FA Cup semi final. The normally secure Victor Lindelof kept losing the ball rather like a man who keeps dropping a bar of soap in the shower or a bath. Eric Bailly, Nemanja Matic and the youngsters Brandon Williams alongside Daniel James were also culpable and frequently prone to sloppiness. Bruno Fernandes is certain to be one of the finest signings United have made in recent years with his cultured style and playmaking instincts but this was not his most notable hour.

Chelsea extended their lead shortly into the second half when the abundantly skilful Mason Mount capitalised on some Manchester United daydreaming at the back. A loose ball from United's Brandon Williams found Mount who surged forward to blast the ball towards goal. The shot itself should have been dealt with far more adroitly by United keeper De Gea but the Spaniard had an attack of butter fingers and the ball slipped under him. Chelsea could now see the bigger prize.

United were now the wounded animal that doesn't quite know how to fight back because the lions are still surrounding them and there's nowhere for them to go. When Paul Pogba came on as a sub during the second half, United's attack finally showed signs of life but the damage had been done. United were well and truly a busted flush and there could have been no disguising their defensive deficiencies on the day.

When Mason Mount, always the inventive figure in Chelsea's coltish midfield tickled the ball forward and then pulled the ball back to the onrushing Antonio Rudiger you could literally hear a pin drop. Rudiger darted into space to meet the Mount delivery with a goal typical of the quality Chelsea had brought to the table. A third goal had now ensured outright victory for Chelsea and you wondered how the Stretford End reacted had they been forced to witness this uncharacteristically lacklustre United performance.

And so we are now confronted with another Arsenal - Chelsea FA Cup Final which is rather like having the same breakfast cereal every morning from the same bowl. Familiarity could breed admiration by the end of these derby contests between the same sides. Arsenal, under Michel Arteta, surprisingly outclassed Manchester City and could provide us with an FA Cup Final to savour for many a season.

But the undeniable fact that this year's Cup Final will be totally unlike any of the preceding 130 and the rest. In the old Wembley's first ever Final between Bolton Wanderers and West Ham United, a couple of galloping horses and a farcical crowd of roughly 200,000 fans would single it out for attention as almost unique. Even Billy the Horse couldn't prevent the 1923 FA Cup Final from disappearing into some ludicrous obscurity.

On August 1, Arsenal and Chelsea will walk out of the Wembley tunnel and into a vast mausoleum where the only sound you'll probably hear all afternoon will be that of the referee's whistle and several crows hovering around the Wembley arch curious to know why an English FA Cup Final will also be the quietest of all time.

We will of course close our eyes and pretend that the days of hugely atmospheric and emotional FA Cup Finals can still be felt and heard. We'll try to imagine that the waving banners, the joky placards and the humorous chants can never be erased from our minds because that's the way perhaps things should be but aren't. Wembley Stadium, for the first time in its history, will have to reminisce on happier days and look forward to a future that can only be healthier and better. We must believe that it will.