London, May 16 / BNA / Chelsea retained the FA Women’s Cup, Sunday, by winning 3-2 in extra time over Manchester City, to complete the double this season after winning the Premier League title last week.
City equalized with two goals, first through Lauren Hemp after Sam Kerr’s opener, and near the end, Haile Rasso called out Erin Cuthbert’s screaming. However, Kerr scored an early goal in the first half of extra time to give Chelsea the FA Cup for the fourth time, Reuters reported.
It is Chelsea’s 11th major trophy under Emma Hayes since the Briton took charge in 2012.
The defending champions opened the scoring after the half-hour mark at Wembley with a header from Australian striker Kerr after a deep cross from Millie Bright. But they made a beautiful comeback from the City Hemp striker shortly before the break.
Chelsea midfielder Cuthbert fired a long-range shot that hit the crossbar for nearly an hour to restore the lead and that looked like enough to win as the clock ticked on.
However, Gareth Taylor City never gave up, and in the 89th minute, Australian Raso hit a long cross from Alex Greenwood of City, ran towards the goal and hit it in the equalizer to take the match into overtime.
City pressed for the win but faltered nine minutes into the first half when Kerr grabbed the ball in her own half and ran towards goal before seeing her shot veered off Greenwood and slammed into the net.
He then kept Chelsea City on the brink of winning the FA Cup for the second time in a row in front of 49,094 fans, a record attendance for the final surpassing the previous record of 45,423 fans in 2018.
Cuthbert told the BBC: “I don’t score goals like that, but it’s a great honour.
“I thought it would be a successful goal and it wasn’t, Sam was just as important, it took an aberration and it doesn’t matter what the goal looks like as long as it lasts. If they go in like I’m happy at Wembley.
“Many times this year we’ve faced adversity, COVID, injuries, we had to use the team. We used the team today and I’m proud to finish at such a high level.”