Liverpool knock Arsenal out of Adobe Women’s FA Cup

Liverpool face Chelsea in the Adobe Women’s FA Cup Semi-Finals, Manchester City will host Manchester United.

Manchester City 2-0 Aston VillaArsenal 0-1 LiverpoolChelsea 1-0 Crystal Palace

A late own-goal saw Liverpool pull off a surprise win away to Arsenal, to set up a semi-final clash away to Chelsea on Sunday 13 April.

Olivia Smith was a threat for Liverpool in the first half but the best chance fell to team-mate Sophie Roman Haug, who intercepted an attempted clearance by Daphne van Domselaar but was unable to get the ball past the Arsenal goalkeeper.

The Gunners’ custodian survived losing the ball to Roman Haug a second time, while Steph Catley shot narrowly wide for Arsenal.

With a dozen minutes of the 90 left, Liverpool took the lead as Roman Haug hit the post and the rebound went in off the back of Van Domselaar for an own-goal.

A dominant Chelsea only had a narrow win over Crystal Palace after having two goals disallowed.

Lauren James missed the target when connecting with a cross to the far post and Aggie Beever-Jones had a couple of close-range attempts blocked.

Beever-Jones did have the ball in the net just after the half-hour mark but the cross had come from an offside Catarina Macario.

Macario fired across goal and inches wide late in the first half, then set up Beever-Jones whose effort cleared the bar.

Early in the second half, Blues keeper Hannah Hampton had to rush out to beat Clarissa Larisey to Chloe Arthur’s long ball, then at the other end half-time substitute Johanna Rytting Kaneryd could not direct a volley home.

Chelsea had a second goal disallowed for offside, Macario netting but with Erin Cuthbert on the deck in front of her.

Eventually Chelsea had the lead, the ball falling from a corner for James who drilled a shot low into the net.

Cuthbert should have made it 2-0 soon after,

Khadija Shaw pulled a great chance wide for a dominant Manchester City after side-stepping two defenders but Aston Villa had their own clear opportunity with Ebony Salmon through on goal, only for Ayaka Yamashita to make a fine stop in turning the ball over the crossbar.

Shaw did make the breakthrough seven minutes after the restart, coolly slotting the ball under Sabrina D’Angelo after a fine pass by Mary Fowler.

A defensive mistake handed City the ball outside the Villa box and Vivianne Miedema set up Jess Park to doubled the advantage in the last 20 minutes.

D’Angelo did very well to turn another Park strike round the post, Salmon went close for Villa and later Rachel Daly could not quite head home her ball to the far post.

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