732 teams entered this year’s Emirates FA Cup, with just four now remaining and heading to Wembley Stadium. Leicester City were looking to join Coventry City in beating higher tier opposition, and causing an upset but despite taking it to the wire, it wasn't to be. Here's what we learnt as Chelsea left it late to see off Leicester City.
Cup Chaos
This game had all the drama that you would expect from a crucial quarter-final cup tie, and more. A penalty (missed), a pitch-invader, a bizarre own goal, a red card, stoppage time winners and six goals overall.
A 4-2 scoreline flattered the home side, despite a dominant first-half performance, in which they should have scored more, not least due to Raheem Sterling’s penalty miss with the score at 1-0. Sterling having won the penalty, took the ball from the hands of Chelsea’s regular penalty taker, Cole Palmer, and tamely passed the ball into the gloves of X.
In the second-half, Axel Disasi handed the visitors a path back into the game by halving the deficit, when a wild back pass from the French defender to goalkeeper Robert Sanchez flew into the Chelsea net from between 30 to 40 yards. Commentator Pat Nevin described the goal 'ridiculous'.
Callum Doyle’s red card (first-given as a penalty and a yellow card and then VAR overruled to a decision of a free-kick and a red card), with the score at 2-2, tipped the dial back in the Premier League side’s favour, after Leicester City had drawn themselves back level and put Chelsea on the ropes for much of the second-half.
Fan Fury
Frustrations were voiced from three sides of Stamford Bridge stadium at a couple of crunch moments in the match, with Raheem Sterling the main focal point of that attention. His tame penalty attempt in the first-half was followed up by a shockingly bad free-kick in the second, which went into the top tier of the Matthew Harding stand and nowhere near the goal.
Boos from the home crowd followed him thereafter, and shouts of ‘you don’t know what you’re doing’ were directed at Mauricio Pochettino’s dugout when the Chelsea manager chose to substitute Mykhailo Mudryk eight minutes before Sterling was hooked off to jeers. Sterling later issued an apology to the Chelsea supporters via Instagram, saying he would come back ‘ten times’ stronger.
Instant Impact
Carney Chukwuemeka and Noni Madueke came on to steer Chelsea into the next round and save the blushes of Disasi, Pochettino and Sterling.
Chukwuemeka made it 3-2 to Chelsea following a slick pass and receive move with Palmer in the 92nd minute to sink Leicester's resolve, before a sublime solo strike from Madueke, curling the ball in from outside the area in the 98th minute, added some shine to the scoreline which hid a stressful afternoon for the hosts.
Prolific Palmer
Of course, no Chelsea write-up this season would be complete without a mention of Cole Palmer. A goal and an assist for him saw his total goal involvements for Chelsea rise to 25 this season. Contrast his fortunes with that of Sterling, out of the England squad again this week, as Palmer received the call up to his second senior squad. Palmer was pipped to the Man of the Match award by the impressive Malo Gusto, another Chelsea player with a season to be proud of amidst the wider inconsistencies.
Other positives include both Ben Chilwell and Marc Cucurella returning from injury, the latter scoring his first Chelsea goal to open the scoring; Madueke scored his first goal in the FA Cup and Pochettino will now take his team to Wembley for the second time in his debut season, aiming to break their run of cup final defeats and deliver some silverware Todd Boehly’s regime.