Despite one of the most farcical construction projects ever, the old Wembley stadium was demolished and rebuilt in between this and our last cup final. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since that FA Cup final. Football is different. Aston Villa is very different.

For these reasons, and an almost infinite number of others, and I doubt I was alone here, I found myself almost overcome with emotion and pride as I watched Martin O’Neill lead his team out onto the Wembley turf. It really was a wonderful spectacle to see giant pictures of our players and manager adorning the fantastic new English football HQ.

It started brightly with Emile Heskey winning a free kick down the left and Ashley Young whipping in the free kick to win a corner. There was just 3:16 on the clock when Stephen Warnock took a long throw in from the Villa half which Heskey won in the air, finding Ash who hooked the ball on from just inside the half for Gabby to chase down the left channel.

There were acres of space and it was a straight foot race between Gabby and Vidic. There could only be one winner. Of course, Gabby absolutely skinned the Utd defender, but his touch let him down a little as he entered the box and over ran the ball. Vidic, in his desperation to make up lost ground, inexplicably tugged on Gabby’s shirt and then dived in for good measure, hacking the Villa forward down. An absolute nailed on penalty, no one could credibly argue otherwise.

Phil Dowd didn’t hesitate and pointed to the spot immediately. I was already jumping around, but at this point I turned into a complete lunatic screaming “PENALTY!!! PENALTY!!!” while trying to compose myself enough to update the live blog and Twitter.

Under the excitement it didn’t occur to me that perhaps Vidic was the “last man” and should have been sent for an early bath. I didn’t hear or notice the subject coming up at the time either, although when I watched the game back I did notice Petrov talking to Dowd and the referee shaking his head vigorously. Perhaps the captain was asking him at that point whether Vidic ought to be shown a red card. I don’t know.

Milner dispatched the penalty with level of fearless professionalism you’d expect and I was in dream land. We were 1-0 up on Man Utd in the Carling Cup final inside the first five minutes. I still wasn’t thinking about whether Vidic should be on the pitch or not.

Instead of falling back under an inevitable wave of Utd pressure, Villa held their own and appeared to push for another. A sublime little back heel by Petrov to Ashley Young down the right channel resulting in a low, driven cross which unfortunately didn’t make it to Gabby, whet the appetite for what was bound to be some exciting football from Villa.

But just before the 10 minute mark, it started to unravel. An unusually sloppy pass by Carlos Cuellar was seized upon by an energetic Michael Owen who surged forward with intent. Owen brushed off Petrov leaving James Collins little option but to dive in, bringing Owen down in the process. Phil Dowd went straight to his pocket and showed the Welshman a yellow card. Hang on, that was a booking, but Vidic got nothing?

It was just before 12 minutes on the clock when Fletcher his a long ball through for Berbatov, but Dunne easily intercepted. Somehow he got his touch wrong, maybe the bounce caught him off guard, but he spilled possession straight to the lurking Bulgarian who turned and set off towards goal with the Irishman chasing hot on his heels.

Dunne caught Berbatov and made a quite stunning saving tackle to dispossess him in the box without giving away a penalty, it’s really worth noting. However, James Collins had been drawn across to cover and as luck would have it, Dunne’s tackle knocked the ball into space behind Collins, leaving him flat footed to cover. Would you believe who was running into that exact space at that exact moment? Yeah, Michael Owen.

Owen hit the shot first time with his right boot, bisecting Collins and Cuellar, who had also joined the effort. Friedel had no chance, it was inch perfect, low and driven to the far post. 1-1.

Within a minute or two I started seeing angry tweets pointing out that Vidic shouldn’t be on the pitch. Oh yeah, that seemed a good point, although he didn’t play any part in this goal and Utd showed us at Villa Park that they’re still quite a good side with only 10 men. I suppose the argument would have to be that had Vidic been sent off we’d have to assume that Ferguson would probably have responded by sacrificing one of his forwards for a defender and this goal couldn’t have happened. Fair point. Speculative, but not without substance.

Villa continued positively though. 3 minutes later James Milner cut in from the right and fired a left footed shot that Tomasz Kuszczak was forced to parry, the ball falling to Gabby who attempted to curl one in with a delicate side footed effort that fell just wide. Still looking good. The Villa fans in fantastic voice again.

Then just inside the 18th minute, Stewart Downing slid in with an ill-timed tackle on Evra and again Phil Dowd immediately responded by holding a yellow card aloft. OK, perhaps this was a fair call, but in comparison to Vidic? Well, no, but if the referee is now showing everyone that he’s not going to tolerate any more tough tackles, then fine, it’s the same for both sides, right?

Actually, no. Just 90 seconds later Milner fed Heskey in space on the half way line who turned smartly (hey, Heskey normally has the turning circle of a 747, credit where it’s due here) and set off towards goal with Gabby making a run for him on the left. Carrick made a desperate, lunging tackle to bring the big man down, Dowd blew his whistle and immediately called Carrick to one side…. for a stern talking to. Are you kidding me?

Alright, I could go on from here on this theme, but you can see what I’m driving at. Ultimately, the big debate will be about whether Vidic should have been sent off. To the letter of the law, yes, he was certainly the last man, but if he’s not blatantly and cynically chopping down Gabby in full stride heading straight towards goal, you’ll do well to find a referee who would have sent him off 4 minutes into a cup final.

Let’s be fair here, that’s a big, big call, regardless of what the rules say. You really have to make a challenge of Paul Gascoigne level stupidity to get shown a red so early in a final – the older readers will probably recall the tackle I’m referring to. Should timing have any relevance to punishment? Absolutely not, the rules are the rules from the first to the last minute, but we all know it does.

Without wanting to make any excuses for Phil Dowd, I believe he’s had a negative impact on this game for Villa for sure, but if Gabby’s touch as he entered the box hadn’t caused him to chop his run and Vidic brought him down in full stride, I believe he would have gone. By stalling to regain control of the ball, he’s opening up a grey area in the wording of the rule which says “denies an obvious goalscoring opportunity to an opponent moving towards the player’s goal“.

Again, I’m not saying that Phil Dowd got it exactly right, I’m simply saying that four minutes into a final he’s interpreted “moving towards the player’s goal” slightly differently to how some of us viewed the incident. Maybe that same incident would have looked different to Mr Dowd in the 80th minute, I don’t know.

However, I’m definitely saying that following this incident Dowd was far from consistent, booking Villa players while letting Utd players off with a talking to for exactly the same offense. He hasn’t done much to help his cause with such an erratic performance for the rest of the game.

Ultimately, as strongly as I felt after the final whistle about Dowd’s influence on the game (I said some unkind things on Twitter), I always find it a little weak to blame the referee for a loss. Fair enough if he’s unfairly sent off a player or two and perhaps ruled a goal or two out that should have stood, then I can accept it, but here we’re talking about not sending someone off and not booking a couple of players.

We’re talking about what he hasn’t done, it was still in our hands to overcome his incompetence and win the game. It was eleven versus eleven for 90 minutes, we were simply beaten by a better team and there’s no shame in admitting that, folks.

Look, once again we saw that it’s really just a player or two that separates us from the likes of Man Utd, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool. It’s a Rooney, a Torres or Gerrard, a Fabregas or a Drogba. Not a Phil Dowd.

The neutrals were calling it an entertaining game, which so often is not the case with a cup final. Think about it, we’re described as one-dimensional and a long ball side, our own fans repeatedly claim that “the football isn’t improving” on their blogs – well, the delusional ones do – and yet here we were, mixing it up and genuinely competing in a thrilling cup final with Man Utd and our record shows that was no fluke. I can not put my pride into words, despite the loss and no, I’m not going to pin the loss on the referee I’m afraid.

For large parts of the game, it was Man Utd that sat back and invited us onto them, choosing to hit us on the break. That’s our game plan! Our biggest shortcoming was that we didn’t appear to have the invention to get past a Utd side sitting so deep. Frequently our ventures forward were halted and the ball moved backwards and sidewards, leaving Utd patiently waiting for a mistake to pounce upon.

But again, not only are we competing with top four sides regularly in entertaining games, now we’re encountering the situation where they’re paying us the respect of sitting deep. And there’s still Villa fans out there who are unhappy with the direction we’re going?? Wow.

I remain extremely happy. Extremely positive. Sure, a little disappointed that they couldn’t find that extra 10% required for a win in this game, but I’m incredibly proud of the performance they did muster. I’m also proud of the travelling Villa fans who sang their hearts out and were heard all around the world, well done to every one of them in the stadium

To those who couldn’t make it and couldn’t get tickets, perhaps they’ll get another chance in the FA Cup. Two, possibly three, trips to Wembley in one season will be a massive achievement for Aston Villa, but from what I’ve seen from the boys lately, they absolutely can do it.

UTV