Aston Villa News 24/7It’s just 50 hours until kick off. On Saturday afternoon we’ll be at Wembley for the second time this season. This time it’s the FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea. It’s no small game.
And yet, I haven’t managed to create the build up I was expecting this week. I’ve changed the background image (which you may need to refresh your cache to see – either hold down Ctrl + F5 or Shift + click on your browser’s Refresh button), but otherwise, I’ve barely mentioned it. It’s almost been the elephant in the room. I wonder why?
Thanks to ant57 (flickr) for the picture from the FA Cup Final 2000 against Chelsea.
There’s a couple of possible reasons I suppose. Firstly, the result from Stamford Bridge has to be a factor. It’s almost a foreboding cloud hanging over our heads – no one wants to see us humiliated like that again on this stage. I wonder if that’s impacted ticket sales since we still have some of our allocation available for sale.
Secondly, it may be the very fact that the game is being held at Wembley that is ironically taking some of the shine off the match for me. I know that I’m far from alone on this one; playing the semi-finals at Wembley just removes the prestige of going there for the final and is clearly more about the FA extracting every last penny from the competition than what is best for the fans. I may be in the minority with my acceptance of most of the sport’s commercialism these days, but this is a step too far.
When you consider that the recent result against Chelsea not only reiterates how big a challenge it will be to win this game, but also introduces the frightening prospect of an absolute drubbing, factor in the cost of going to Wembley so soon after the Carling Cup final and mix in the consideration that we might actually win this and have to go back, it’s no wonder that tickets are still available. Throw in the current economic climate and you can slap the “no-brainer” tag on it.
Quick quiz question (answer at the bottom):- Which stadium has hosted the most FA Cup semi-final matches [hint: it's not Wembley].
I think the main hope that I hold right now for the match is one of atonement. Not just for the debacle at Stamford Bridge, but also the final from 2000 where we lost 1-0 to Chelsea in an extremely drab affair. I think that we’re more than capable of making this an exciting game and perhaps having the point to prove will spur the boys on. I don’t think that we have to win to achieve this. As long as the boys give it their best, as they did against Man Utd in the Carling Cup, I’ll be proud.
Recent History
This will be only the 3rd FA Cup semi-final we’ve reached in the last 20 years. The 1996 semi-final against Liverpool was staged at Old Trafford and we lost 3-0. It took a penalty shoot out, which we won 4-1, to beat Bolton in the 2000 semi-final after a goalless draw at Wembley.
The final in 2000 was the first we had reached since 1957, where we beat Man Utd 2-1 in somewhat controversial circumstances. It would interesting to speculate what Sir Alex “Typical Germans” Ferguson might have had to say in Sir Matt Busby’s shoes, but I think we’ll leave that for another time.
FA Youth Cup
Incidentally, the youth team will run out in the first leg of their FA Youth Cup semi-final tie against Newcastle at Villa Park tonight. In some of the weirdest scheduling I’ve ever seen, Chelsea have already beaten Blackburn over two legs in the other semi-final, played last month.
Good luck to the young lions for tonight and for the second leg at St James’ Park on the 16th. Should they make it past Newcastle, the final will also be a two-legged affair to be played at Villa Park and Stamford Bridge.
Quiz Answer: Of course, Villa Park has staged the most FA Cup semi-final matches, but you already knew that!
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6 Comments to “Eyes Turning To Wembley Once More”
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I don’t know why, but I have very little enthusiasm for this semi.
It’s mad really, because as you say, we don’t get there very often.
The FA cup used to be the highlight of the season for me as a kid, when getting to watch a final involving any teams meant crowds of people getting together with bumper cans of beer.
Now, holding semis at the dog-hole that is Wembley, has just belittled the whole thing imo.
I was at OT for the 96 semi, but have no interest whatsoever in going this time.
I can’t think of any longtime fans that I know who are are going either.
yeah, enthusiasm is exactly what i’m struggling to drum up.
obviously there shall be no such problems should we find a way past chelsea. especially since we’ll eminently more beatable opposition in the final. well, in theory anyway.
that said, i’ll probably be all giddy on saturday morning.
I’ve seen a poll on Vital that says I’m massively in the minority.
Why?
Sadly, I’d rather be fourth than win the cup.
Silverware doesn’t do it for me as much as playing on the top stage does now.
And that’s quite perverse to my lifelong way of thinking.
I put it down to the same few clubs winning all the goodies so often since the PL’s inception, that even the title is not massively important anymore.
If you’re not in the CL, you’re not in the game, simple as that imo.
Just goes to show how the CL has ruined everything
that’s interesting. it is what it is i guess. right or wrong, better or worse, we have to get in the CL or at least have a league where it isn’t the same 4 getting in every season.
i still like the FA Cup. for me, it’s the existence of the League Cup that devalues that competition. since no non-league side are ever going to win the FA cup, there’s effectively no difference between them.
i say kick the League Cup to the curb, or at least restrict entry to teams that are not playing in Europe that year.
“I still like the FA Cup. For me, it’s the existence of the League Cup that devalues that competition”.
I disagree.
The LC served a very good purpose for what? 40 years?
It still can do, imo, if you make it worth winning.
Does it still get you Europe?
They’ve f***ed about with things that much, I really don’t know anymore
The Eufa/Uefa cup worked too, but there obviously wasn’t enough money in it, so they messed with that too.
So now we have the Europa cup/league.
Does the Europa mean you get CL automatically?
Who knows?
And in all honesty, who cares?
Which somewhat proves my point, in that CL is all that matters these days.
“The LC served a very good purpose for what? 40 years?”
the purpose it served was to provide midweek games to make use of the then new technology of floodlights. i would call that a text book example of something that is antiquated to the point of irrelevance.
there’s no money in it. there’s no prestige beyond it being used in a combo to claim that you’ve done the “double”, or the “treble” in a season. for instance, if that is all that Utd wins this season, will they be happy?
you’ve already conceded that the landscape has changed to the point that CL is almost the holy grail. that being the case, a silly cup that offers europa league to the winner only is frequently completely pointless from that perspective.
the only worth it has is for teams to get into europe who probably wouldn’t by other means. in which case, restrict the top clubs from entering and the rest have something to compete for.
otherwise, it remains entirely pointless IMO.