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Chelsea 1 – 1 Everton

Everton celebrate Phil Neville's winning penalty

Everton will play Reading at home on 1 March for a spot in the quarter-finals

By David Ornstein

Phil Neville hit the winning spot-kick as Everton booked their place in the last 16 of the FA Cup with a dramatic penalty shoot-out victory over Chelsea.

Frank Lampard put Chelsea ahead in the fourth-round replay with a low strike in the first half of extra time.
But Everton stunned Stamford Bridge by equalising at the death through a curling Leighton Baines free-kick.
In the penalty shoot-out, both sides missed once before Ashley Cole fired over and Neville sealed a 4-3 triumph.
It prompted wild celebrations from the visiting players and supporters, all revelling in Everton’s first victory at Chelsea since 1994 and their first away win against a fellow Premier League club in the FA Cup since 1990.
The reward for David Moyes‘s men is a meeting with Championship outfit Reading at Goodison Park on 1 March – and the result also goes some way to avenging their loss to Chelsea in 2009’s final.

Chelsea were bidding to become the first side in 125 years to win the FA Cup three years in a row, but they must now regroup for Tuesday’s Champions League last-16 first leg away to FC Copenhagen.
This result is another severe blow to Blues manager Carlo Ancelotti, who has already seen his team’s Premier League title defence come off the rails and their Carling Cup bid ended by Newcastle.
Everton, by contrast, will be ecstatic and Moyes must hope his charges can use this win as a springboard to get them out of relegation trouble.
The Toffees felt they did enough to merit victory in the original tie at Goodison Park, which ended 1-1, and set out as if desperate to make up for that missed opportunity.
Their 2-0 loss at Bolton on Sunday would also have provided a source of motivation, with Moyes describing it as “one of the worst performances” he had seen during his nine-year reign.
The visitors bristled with intent early on and managed to pin Chelsea inside their own half by holding a high line and getting their full-backs forward at every opportunity.
But their Achilles heel this season has been the absence of a sustained cutting edge up front, and so it proved again as Jermaine Beckford struggled to impose himself on a Blues defence missing ineligible new signing David Luiz.

Predictably, therefore, it was Chelsea who came closest to opening the scoring when a Lampard set-piece was glanced on to his own post by Phil Jagielka.
That was Chelsea’s first meaningful chance and it seemed to spur them into life as Lampard saw a close-range shot blocked and Tim Howard saved with his legs to deny Florent Malouda.
Chelsea had an injury concern over Didier Drogba – in for the cup-tied Fernando Torres – but the Ivorian striker soon recovered to put Malouda through on goal, only for Howard to foil the Frenchman.
The hosts were by now on top and, after Drogba had fizzed a shot over from 30 yards, they were furious when Ramires was cautioned for diving following a challenge by Howard in the penalty area.
Ancelotti used half-time to replace the ineffective John Mikel Obi with first-choice holding midfielder Michael Essien and the move seemed to give Chelsea added impetus.
They spent the beginning of the second period encamped in Everton’s half and two Drogba free-kicks came close to breaking the deadlock – the first picked up well by Howard, the second headed wide by Lampard.

Frank Lampard celebrates the opening goal

Chelsea looked to have won it through Lampard’s extra-time opener

Everton managed to weather that storm and carved out a couple of their own openings, Leon Osman heading straight at Petr Cech and Beckford skewing way off target.
But back came Chelsea and they created two chances in quick succession, Howard reacting brilliantly to deny Lampard before an Ivanovic effort was inadvertently blocked by team-mate Salomon Kalou.
Yet the Mersysiders held out once more and soon grew in confidence, substitute Diniyar Bilyaletdinov crossing from Coleman to power a header at Cech.
Moyes opted to replace Beckford with Anichebe and the move almost paid immediate dividends as the Nigerian stretched but narrowly failed to convert another Bilyaletdinov centre.
At the other end Lampard squandered a glorious chance – floating a chip over the bar when he surely would have scored with a more direct strike – before Everton thought they had won it.
Baines unleashed a fierce right-footed drive that Cech could only parry and Fellaini tapped home, but he was ruled offside and replays suggested the decision was correct.
Extra time arrived and Ancelotti’s decision to replace Anelka with Malouda brought Chelsea the opening goal when the striker’s cross found its way to Lampard and the Englishman slotted home.
The previously-tense atmosphere suddenly fell flat and Chelsea looked set to comfortably take their place in the fifth round.
But Everton had other ideas and after they were awarded a free-kick on the edge of area, Baines stepped up to curl a delightful set-piece into Cech’s top left-hand corner.
It meant penalties would be needed and after Baines and Anelka had both missed, Cole blazed into the stands and Everton captain Neville place his kick into the top corner to seal a famous win.

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Written by Israel Saria

For the last 20 years I have been working as a football pundit. This experience has provided me with a very useful insight into football and the opportunity to carry out extensive research into the game including its players, the stadiums, the rules and tactics and I have also been grateful to meet a wide range of people connected to football in the UK, Tanzania, Germany .....

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