\n<\/p>\n
Manchester City will briefly shift their focus from the Premier League title race as they face Chelsea in Saturday\u2019s 145th FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium, aiming to secure a second domestic cup double.<\/p>\n
It will be the first ever FA Cup final meeting between the two clubs, while City are appearing in a record fourth consecutive final.<\/p>\n
Chelsea booked their place in the showpiece event after edging past Leeds United 1-0 in the semi-finals thanks to Enzo Fern\u00e1ndez\u2019s first-half header. The victory secured Chelsea a place in their 17th FA Cup final, with only Manchester United (22) and Arsenal (21) reaching more.<\/p>\n
However, the Blues have found finals at Wembley difficult in recent years, drawing blanks in four consecutive appearances since Christian Pulisic netted against Arsenal in the 2020 FA Cup final defeat.<\/p>\n
Chelsea are bidding to win the FA Cup for a ninth time, with each of their previous eight triumphs coming under different managers. Interim boss Calum McFarlane is hoping to continue that trend.<\/p>\n
Since 2016\/17, Manchester City and Chelsea have been the FA Cup\u2019s most successful sides, with City winning 45 matches to Chelsea\u2019s 37.<\/p>\n
The two clubs also lead the way for goals scored (159 and 111, respectively) and clean sheets kept (28 and 26).<\/p>\n
Chelsea currently sit ninth in the Premier League, six points behind the top six, and only managed to stop their downward spiral with a 1-1 draw against Liverpool at Anfield last weekend. Although that result ended a dreadful six-game losing streak, it also stretched their league winless run to seven matches. Securing European football through the league now appears unlikely, but FA Cup glory would seal a Europa League spot.<\/p>\n
Third round | Charlton Athletic (A) | W 5-1<\/p>\n
Fourth round | Hull City (A) | W 4-0<\/p>\n
Fifth round | Wrexham (A) | W 4-2 (aet)<\/p>\n
Quarter-finals | Port Vale (H) | W 7-0<\/p>\n
Semi-final | Leeds (Wembley) | W 1-0.<\/p>\n
earlier this season, Manchester City now have the chance to complete a domestic cup double for the second time in their history, becoming only the sixth side to achieve the feat in English football.<\/p>\n
Pep Guardiola\u2019s side will become the first side to feature in four consecutive FA Cup finals, although they head into this year\u2019s showpiece having lost the previous two against Manchester United and Crystal Palace after their 2023 triumph over the Red Devils.<\/p>\n
Manchester City remain on course for a domestic treble as they continue to pile pressure on Arsenal in the Premier League title race. Consecutive 3-0 victories over and Crystal Palace have moved Guardiola\u2019s side within two points of the league leaders with just two games remaining.<\/p>\n
Since losing the 2020\/21 UEFA Champions League final to Thomas Tuchel\u2019s Chelsea, City have not lost any of their last 13 games against the Blues in all competitions (W10 D3).<\/p>\n
Third round | Exeter City (H) | W 10-1<\/p>\n
Fourth round | Salford City (H) | W 2-0<\/p>\n
Fifth round | Newcastle United (A) | W 3-1<\/p>\n
Quarter-finals | Liverpool (H) | W 4-0<\/p>\n
Semi-finals | Southampton (Wembley) | W 2-1<\/p>\n
Chelsea will be without Estevao Willian, Jamie Gittens and Jesse Derry due to injuries.<\/p>\n
McFarlane has confirmed that Pedro Neto, Alejandro Garnacho and Robert S\u00e1nchez have all trained this week and could be involved on Saturday.<\/p>\n
The Citizens\u2019 only injury concern is Rodri, who has missed the last five games with a groin issue and remains a doubt.<\/p>\n
Chelsea (4-2-3-1)<\/strong>: Sanchez, Gusto, Fofana, Colwill, Cucurella, James, Caicedo, Palmer, Fernandez, Neto, Joao Pedro.<\/p>\n Manchester City (4-2-3-1)<\/strong>: Trafford, Nunes, Khusanov, Guehi, O’Reilly, Gonzalez, Bernardo, Semenyo, Cherki, Doku, Haaland.<\/p>\n Prediction: Chelsea 1-2 Manchester City<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Manchester City will briefly shift their focus from the Premier League title race as they…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8902,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chelsea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8901"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8901\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8902"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}