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After 150 years, the FA Cup still finds itself with new stories to tell. Here was a magnificent fourth-round tie that lurched one way then the other, that simply would not stick to your preconceptions of how these games were supposed to end.
A 2-1 win for Chelsea over League One Plymouth means this is perhaps not one for the annals of this wonderful competition, but those who shivered through two hours of high drama at Stamford Bridge will never forget a match that resolutely refused to stick to the script.
As the Chelsea misses in the second half of normal time and early in extra time grew ever more preposterous, you could feel the inevitability of a Plymouth bolt from the blue, the classic tale of cup upset. Marcos Alonso seemed to have spoiled that but no matter, the visitors would rise again, winning a penalty with time running out. Surely they were about to take it to the shootout and win there? No. Kepa Arrizabalaga, once a laughing stock of a world’s most expensive goalkeeper, denied Ryan Hardie a place in FA Cup history.
It was the cruelest of endings for Plymouth, a reminder that while this competition is adept at making dreams into reality, it is no less effective at crushing them in the most dramatic of fashions.
No one could content Chelsea did not dominate this contest but they never looked entirely at ease; certainly, it did not help them that the 6,000 visiting Plymouth fans made enough of a racket to convince that you were in Home Park, the rafters lifted off with chants of “everywhere they go Argyle are massive.” Certainly, they looked like giants when they decamped on mass to attack the Blues box for an early free kick.
Jordan Houghton’s delivery was right on the mark, giving his teammates a run on the ball that the Chelsea defense did not. Still, Romelu Lukaku could have done far more to keep Macaulay Gillesphey from getting such a clean head on the ball, his flick…
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Source : cbssports
