2009 FA Cup Final: Chelsea vs Everton

Match Breakdown

The pre-match build up to the 2009 FA Cup Final centred around a demand for both clubs to finish the season with some silverware. Chelsea had just finished 3rd in the Premier League after swapping their manager earlier in the season by replacing a famous Brazilian coach, Luiz Felipe Scolari, with a famous Dutch coach, Guus Hiddink. Their billionaire owner, Roman Abramovich, was unhappy at missing out on the league title to Manchester United but he had already decided that this would be Hiddink's last match to win a trophy before returning full time to his International coaching role with Russia.

Everton had finished an impressive 5th in the league for a second season in a row, cementing David Moyes' reputation as a successful manager despite operating with a much lower transfer budget than some of the clubs that finished below 'The Toffees'. However, this was to be Everton's first trip to Wembley since 1995 when a successful 1 – 0 win over Manchester United gave the Goodison Park faithful their last experience of footballing glory. A trophy had been something that Moyes was striving towards through his steady year-on-year improvement in making Everton a force to be reckoned with.

Team news on the day was clearly in favour of Chelsea as they fielded their strongest team against an Everton side that were missing key players, such as Phil Jagielka and Mikel Arteta, due to injury. Ignoring these concerns though, it was The Toffees who made the swiftest of starts to the match on a hot and sunny day at Wembley. Re-writing the history books with the quickest FA Cup Final goal of all time, French talisman Louis Saha reacted quickest to Marouane Fellaini's headed knock-down  to drill the ball past a helpless Petr Cech to give Everton the lead. Only 25 seconds into the match and Moyes' team were in the ascendency.

The goal clearly spooked the West London side's defenders who seemed nervy and worried about conceding again as Everton's tricky midfielders Leon Osman and Steven Pienaar probed for the next six or seven minutes to create more chances for Saha. However, Chelsea had become known in the previous few years for their mental fortitude and slowly started to ease their way into the game with some clever possession of the ball.

The French forwards, Florent Malouda and Nicolas Anelka, began to stretch the field by staying as wide as possible and occupying the Everton Full-Back's at every opportunity as Tony Hibbert and Leighton Baines began to struggle with their pace. So it was in the 21st minute that Chelsea gained their equaliser when Malouda found space on the left and crossed an exquisite invitation for Drogba to power home a header from six yards out. Drogba's goal celebration appeared to be quite muted as if to tell his teammates 'ok fellas, let's start to relax now....'. Chelsea were now back in the match and spent the rest of the first half toying with the hard-working Everton players who were stuggling to obtain possession of the ball, whilst Frank Lampard and Michael Essien were controlling the midfield battle.

With a stern word from Moyes at half-time, Everton started the second half with a lot more intent and purpose as Saha almost doubled his tally with a header that nearly skimmed the crossbar on it's way over. Tim Cahill, Everton's Australian cult hero, started to push forward more and caused plenty of problems with his determined play and running ability.

Once again though, Chelsea displayed the positive mental attitude instilled into them by Head Coach Hiddink and took the lead in the 72nd minute from a neat long-range finish from Lampard. The ball was played short into the England midfielder's vicinity 25 yards from goal and he turned quickly, albeit onto his weaker left-foot, and struck a sweet shot into the top left corner of the net giving Tim Howard no chance to make a save.

With time running out, Moyes withdrew the old bones of tiring Saha to send on young substitute striker James Vaughn to try and make an impact. However, the Lampard goal seemed to have knocked the wind out of the rest of Everton team who started to flag in the heat and could not react effectively to provide Vaughn with any chances.

Chelsea were controversially denied a third goal when Malouda's thunderous dipping strike bounced off the crossbar and over the goal-line but the referee ruled it out as the speed of the ball made it impossible to verify without the luxury of 'Goal-line Technology'. Nevertheless, the team playing in yellow comfortably held on to the final whistle to win the FA Cup for a fifth time and provide Guus Hiddink with the perfect end to his brief career in charge. Meanwhile for Everton, the statistics unfortunately showed that they had now finished runners-up eight times, more than any other club in the FA Cup's history.