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Sonia Bompastor insists today’s final will be “50-50” between her Chelsea team and Manchester United.
Manchester United’s road to the final:
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R4: Manchester United 7-0 West Brom
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R5: Wolves 0-6 Manchester United
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QF: Manchester United 3-1 Sunderland
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SF: Manchester City 0-2 Manchester United
Ahead of today’s final, our very own Tom Garry sat down with Manchester United manager Marc Skinner to discuss the club’s season and this afternoon’s match at Wembley.
In what may come as quite a shock to some fans, Ella Toone starts on the bench for Manchester United. The midfielder scored a stunning goal for United in last year’s final against Tottenham, but she misses out on a place in Marc Skinner’s starting XI this time around. Likely a tactical decision from the manager.
Team news
Chelsea starting line-up: Hannah Hampton; Lucy Bronze, Millie Bright (C), Nathalie Björn, Naomi Girma, Niamh Charles; Keira Walsh, Erin Cuthbert; Aggie Beever-Jones, Mayra Ramírez, Sandy Baltimore. Substitutes: Becky Spencer, Sjoeke Nüsken, Catarina Macario, Guro Reiten, Ashley Lawrence, Wieke Kaptein, Johanna Rytting Kaneryd, Maika Hamano, Oriane Jean-François.
Manchester United starting line-up: Phallon Tullis-Joyce; Gabby George, Maya Le Tissier (C), Millie Turner, Aoife Mannion; Dominique Janssen, Hinata Miyazawa, Grace Clinton; Leah Galton, Elisabeth Terland, Celin Bizet. Substitutes: Safia Middleton-Patel, Kayla Rendell, Anna Sandberg, Simi Awujo, Lisa Naalsund, Ella Toone, Mared Griffiths, Melvine Malard, Rachel Williams.
Now it’s time for Manchester United to check out the pitch…
Tom Garry
ABBA songs are blasting into the skies from the fan zone, families are enjoying picnics under these cloudy skies and the atmosphere is all very calm. Not a hint of crowd trouble, as you’d expect. Off to the right of Olympic Way, a gathering of United fans are dancing to a club remix of Sweet Caroline. Can you believe we didn’t even make it to midday without hearing that tune? Both sets of fans sound confident they’ll win.
Chelsea have arrived at Wembley!
I want to hear from you! Feel free to email me with any score predictions, feelings, thoughts and all that jazz. Are you off to Wembley today? If so, who will you be supporting? Also, I’m keen to know your thoughts on the new WSL and WSL2 rebranding as that seems to have caused quite a stir this week…
Suzanne Wrack
After 10 years of Wembley Women’s FA Cup finals we have a sell-out crowd, and the approximately 90,000 fans are in for a treat. Sonia Bompastor’s Chelsea are the favourites, unbeaten domestically and bidding for a domestic treble after securing the League Cup and WSL title. However, despite 13 wins in their last 15 games against Manchester United, their dominance is far from certain. This is a different United to the team that suffered a 1-0 loss to the Blues at Wembley two years ago. Marc Skinner’s side are more streetwise and, having knocked out Chelsea on the way to a final and first FA Cup title last season, they understand the occasion and what winning looks and feels like. What to expect? United have the ability to shock Chelsea, but even when not at their best performance-wise this season the Blues have had a plan B or plan C and turned out result after result.
Preamble
Hello, good afternoon and welcome to coverage of the Women’s FA Cup final! Chelsea face Manchester United in front of a capacity Wembley Stadium crowd in what promises to be a fantastic end to the domestic season.
The Blues go into this match with their sights firmly set on achieving a treble having already won the WSL and the League Cup. Meanwhile, United are looking to retain the FA Cup trophy having won it last season with a dominant 4-0 victory over Tottenham.
These two sides last met at Wembley two years ago, when Chelsea clinched a 1-0 win thanks to Sam Kerr, who will not be available this time around. However, Marc Skinner and his team have more experience behind them now and will feel they can go toe-to-toe with the WSL invincibles.
Kick-off is at 1:30pm BST - you won’t want to miss it!
