FA Cup Final 2004 - Winners Manchester United

2004 FA Cup FinalThe Millennium stadium continued as the home for English football for another year whilst Wembley carried on with its reconstruction. This year it played host to Manchester United and Millwall.  Manchester United had ended their season 3rd in the Premiership and Millwall had finished 10th in Division one, they were separated by 27 league places.

The Lead Up to the FA Cup Final 2004

Several records were broken in the final with Millwall fielding the youngest ever player, Curtis Weston, aged 17 years and 119 days, a record that had been previously unbroken for 125 years . Millwall were also the first team outside the top flight since 1992 and only the second since 1982 to reach the FA Cup final.

Manchester United

The 2003/2004 FA Cup schedule for Manchester kicked off with an away trip to Aston Villa and ended 1-2, followed by a trip to the potential giant killers of Northampton Town, but United ended up winning by safe 0-3.  The first home tie of the 03/04 Cup was a fierce fifth round local derby against Manchester City, with United coming out victors with a 4-2 result.  The sixth round tie saw United get past Fulham with a 2-1 win, and then finally the semi final at Villa park saw United see off the 2003 FA Cup winners Arsenal by a goal to nil.

Manager:
Alex Ferguson

  • GK Tim Howard 84'
  • RB Gary Neville
  • CB Wes Brown
  • CB Mikaël Silvestre
  • LB John O'Shea
  • RM Cristiano Ronaldo 84'
  • CM Darren Fletcher 84'
  • CM Roy Keane (c)
  • LM Ryan Giggs
  • SS Paul Scholes
  • CF Ruud Van Nistelrooy

Substitutes:

  • GK Roy Carroll 84'
  • DF Phil Neville
  • MF Nicky Butt 84'
  • MF Eric Djemba-Djemba
  • FW Ole Gunnar Solskjaer 84'

Millwall

MIllwall's campaign started with a third round tie at home against Walsall resulting in a 2-1 win, followed by an away win at Telford United (0,2).  The fifth round tie was at Home to Burnley (1-0) and again they were at home in the sixth against Tranmere Rovers this ended 0-0, Millwall won the replay at Tranmere 1-2.  The semi-final was held at the home ground of fellow finalists Manchester United with Millwall beating Sunderland 1-0.

Player/Manager:
Dennis Wise

  • GK Andy Marshall
  • RB Marvin Elliott
  • CB Matthew Lawrence (Captain)
  • CB Darren Ward
  • LB Robbie Ryan 74'
  • DM Dennis Wise 89'
  • DM David Livermore
  • RM Paul Ifill
  • LM Peter Sweeney
  • AM Tim Cahill
  • CF Neil Harris 75'

Substitutes:

  • GK Willy Guéret
  • DF Alan Dunne
  • MF Barry Cogan 74'
  • MF Curtis Weston 89'
  • FW Mark McCammon 75'

The Result

As was expected by most betting companies Manchester United ended the dreams of Millwall by beating them by 3 goals to nil, Ronaldo opened up just before the break and 2 second half goals from Ruud Van Nistelrooy made a comeback unobtainable for Millwall.

Manchester United 3 – 0 Millwall
Ronaldo 44', van Nistelrooy 65'(Pen), 81'
Millennium Stadium, Cardiff
Attendance: 71,350
Referee: Jeff Winter (North Riding)