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Manchester City
would ease some of the hurt inflicted on them over the last four
decades by Manchester United if they win their FA Cup semi-final at
Wembley Stadium on Saturday and end United’s treble hopes.

Whoever does come
through will start as favourites to win the FA Cup itself on May 14
when they will face the winners of Sunday’s other semi-final between
Bolton Wanderers and Stoke City.

For different
reasons both matches have excited the imagination of fans beyond just
the teams involved; Saturday’s because of the intense rivalry and
significance of the tie to both Manchester clubs, and Sunday’s because
Bolton and Stoke rarely come so close to glory.

United have won
their last seven matches in all competitions and are on a high after
beating Chelsea 2-1 on Tuesday for a 3-1 aggregate success to secure a
place in the semi-finals of the Champions League.

United are also
seven points clear of Arsenal at the top of the Premier League and
there is a possibility they could repeat their Champions League,
Premier League and FA Cup treble of 1999 as they have hit form at just
the right time.

Although they will be without the suspended Wayne Rooney, Ryan Giggs, 37, has been outstanding in their recent run of victories.

“Our confidence is
really high and players are coming back from injury and that’s what you
want at this stage of the season as there are games every three days,”
said Giggs.

“The manager will
chop and change the team… but we’ve got 20 players probably competing
for 11 places.” Unfortunately for United, Rooney, who has returned to
form with 10 goals since Feb 1, is unavailable following his swearing
incident at West Ham United two weeks ago.

City may also have
to make do without the services of former United striker Carlos Tevez,
who picked up a hamstring injury on Monday.

His absence could
dent their chances of reaching the final for the first time since 1981.
Thirty years ago they lost 3-2 to Tottenham Hotspur in a replay while
their last FA Cup success was in 1969 when they beat Leicester City.

Although owner
Sheikh Mansour has invested hundreds of millions into the club, City
have yet to end their 35-year wait for a major trophy and will have to
show a dramatic improvement on their abject display in Monday’s 3-0
loss at Liverpool to prevent United rubbing their noses in the dirt
again.

Even longer

While City’s wait
for major honours has lasted since 1976 when they won the League Cup,
Bolton and Stoke have gone even longer without collecting a major piece
of silverware.

Stoke, who have
been playing in the FA Cup since 1883, have never reached the final.
They last reached the semis in 1972 when they lost to Arsenal. That was
also the year they won their only major trophy beating Chelsea in the
League Cup final. Bolton have won the FA Cup four times, the last of
those triumphs coming in 1958 when Nat Lofthouse, their greatest ever
player who died earlier this year, scored both goals when they beat
Manchester United 2-0 at Wembley.

Both sides, sitting
comfortably in mid-table, have beaten each other in the Premier League
this season, and Bolton manager Owen Coyle says the idea of winning the
Cup as a tribute to Lofthouse, has taken hold in the town.

“It would be nice
if that comes to fruition but I think there’s a lot of tough obstacles
in the way for that to happen,” he told Reuters.

“We’re more than up for the challenge and we will do everything we can to reach the final against a very good Stoke side.”

Stoke manager Tony Pulis told reporters: “It’s a great achievement
that we have got this far but we are not getting carried away with the
idea we have had any sort of success. We have done well in the League
and reaching the Cup final would show we are definitely moving in the
right direction.”

Dutch club, VVV
Venlo has agreed to make Ahmed Musa available for the African Youth
Championship (AYC), but the highly-rated Nigerian forward will only get
to the team’s camp in South Africa on Sunday, a day before the Flying
Eagles’ opening match against Ghana. This is because Musa will play in
Venlo’s league game away to Roda on Saturday.

The Dutch team had earlier refused to release the 19-year-old for the tournament which gets underway on Sunday in South Africa.

This was mainly as
a result of VVV Venlo’s poor position on the Dutch Eredivisie table,
where they are presently enmeshed in a relegation battle.

But Musa was able
to secure his entry visa into South Africa on Thursday in Amsterdam and
will fly out to Johannesburg on Sunday, in time for Nigeria’s opening
match of the AYC against the tournament’s defending champions on Monday.

He will however get
to play only against Ghana and Cameroon before returning to the
Netherlands. He will, nevertheless rejoin the Flying Eagles to
prosecute the remainder of the tournament, that is, if the Nigerian
team makes it to the semi-finals after their game against Gambia on
April 24.

The Nigerian team
left for Johannesburg on Thursday evening for the tournament which runs
from April 17 to May 1. They will arrive South Africa on Friday morning
and will have two days to acclimatize before Monday’s game against
Ghana.

Change in venue

The game against
the Ghanaians will however now take place at the Dobsonville Stadium in
Soweto instead of the Rand Stadium which had earlier been billed to
host the game.

Plans by the
tournament’s organizers to use the Rand Stadium were scrapped owing to
the increasing cost of hosting a tournament that was only awarded to
South Africa following the escalation of violence in Libya in February.

The Dobsonville
Stadium will also host most of the tournament’s matches, except two –
the Mali versus Lesotho game on April 23, and the Nigeria against
Gambia tie on April 24 – which will be played at the Milpark Stadium.

All matches will have free entry but will be ticketed for safety
reasons, while the four semi-finalists will qualify for the Under-20
World Cup in Colombia in October.

A total of N1.4m is
up for grabs as eight teams jostle for glory at this year’s edition of
the Promasidor Para-Soccer Championship whose draws were held yesterday
at the Freedom Park on Lagos Island.

In an interactive
session with the press, Theo Lawson, head of Total Consult, the
organizers of the tournament, stated that each athlete at the event
would get N10,000 for participating.

In addition,
players in the team which finishes the tournament in third place, would
be going home with an additionalN15,000 each, while the players from
the second and first placed teams would each get a cash prize of
N20,000 and N25,000 respectively.

For his part, the
Managing Director of Promasidor Nigeria, Keith Richard, reiterated the
organization’s commitment towards the championship.

“It is part of our
corporate social responsibility and we are not planning to stop this
sponsorship because we hope to give the people who birthed this vision
the wherewithal to execute it,” Richard said.

“When there is that stability, they can move on to think about other things without having to worry about finance.”

One chance

John Sunmonu, one
of the athletes who play for Total Consult Terrors, expressed gratitude
for the opportunity to be able to show his skills.

“This tournament
has given my life a meaning,” said Sunmonu. “We were picked up when
people felt nothing good can come out of us but the organizers and
sponsors saw something nobody saw and they gave us the chance, for that
I am grateful.”

The eight teams
have been drawn into two groups. Group A has last year’s champions,
Lead United along with New Afrikan Shrine Warriors, Kwara Para-Soccer
Club, and Avengers of Lagos.

In group B are
Total Consult Terrors, who finished second in last year’s tournament,
Kaduna Para-Soccer Club, Niger Para-Soccer Club and Baba Mai Mangoro
from Adamawa.

The games will be
played at the indoor sport hall of the University of Lagos from April
22 to 24. The group games will commence at 9am on April 22, while
semi-final matches will come up the following day.

The final comes up on April 24 and gets underway at 12pm.

Coach
of Nigeria’s under 23 men’s football team, Augustine Eguavoen has
expressed delight with the outcome of Wednesday’s draws for the 2012
Olympic Games which saw Nigeria’s Dream Team V pitched against their
counterparts from Tanzania.

The draws which
were released by Africa’s football governing body, CAF, will see the
Nigerian team travelling to Dar es Salaam on Wednesday, May 4 for the
first-leg tie before returning home for the reverse fixture billed for
May 18.

The Tanzanians,
during the last round of the qualifiers for the London 2012 Olympics,
eliminated 2000 Olympic gold medallists Cameroun. After losing 2-1 to
the Camerounians in the first-leg tie in Yaounde, the Tanzanians
responded with a similar score line in Dar es Salaam before advancing
via a 4-3 penalty-shoot-out win.

But Eguavoen is
confident his team will not be added to the list of teams eliminated at
the hands of the East Africans, even as he admits that the draws could
had been tougher, as Nigeria could have easily been pitched against the
likes of Egypt, Senegal, or even Sudan who were responsible for the
elimination of Ghana.

“It is not bad. It
could had been worse, so I am happy with the draw as it gives us a good
chance to progress,” said Eguavoen. “That doesn’t mean it will be a
stroll in the park for us as they have got to be respected.

He added: “Any team
capable of holding its own against the Camerounians has got to be
respected. But I am confident. I believe in this team and I’m sure we
will make it to the next round.”

Mini-tournament

The next round will
see the eight teams left in the competition being drawn into two groups
in a mini-tournament to be played in December at a yet-to-be-determined
venue, at the end of which the top three-placed teams will qualify for
the Olympics.

The fourth best placed team will however qualify for a play-off with an opponent from the Asian continent.

Meanwhile, Nigeria’s Dream Team V will tomorrow leave for Monrovia,
venue of this weekend’s All Africa Games qualifier against Liberia.
Twenty players made the team for the trip and they include senior
internationals Ekigho Ehiosun and Chibuzor Okonkwo who came in as a
replacement for right-back Emmanuel Anyanwu, who is in the Flying
Eagles team to the Africa Youth Championship in South Africa.

Nigeria’s
U-20 team, the Flying Eagles, will today depart for South Africa ahead
of the Africa Youth Championship (AYC) which kicks off this Sunday
through May 1.

The Flying Eagles
are booked into the Southern Sun Grayston in Johannesburg, and will
play their Group B matches at the Rand Stadium.

Nigeria alongside
seven other African countries, will battle for a ticket to the Youth
World Cup billed for Colombia later this year and winning the top prize
from the tournament.

Coach John Obuh
last week, named a 21-man list for the championship and remains
confident that his lads are good enough to conquer Africa and get an
unprecedented 6th African title.

The Flying Eagles
take on reigning world champions and bitter rivals, Black Satellites of
Ghana, in the opening match of Group B at the Rand Stadium on Monday
and also have dates with perennial rivals Cameroon and Gambia.

According to Obuh,
who was at the helm of affairs when the Golden Eaglets won silver at
the last edition of the Cadet World Cup hosted in Nigeria, his players
are now more matured and set to improve on their previous performances.

“The U-17
competition was held two years ago, so the players are two years more
mature and better now, and so we hope to go one better this time
around”, he said.

He added: “I will not single out any side because all the teams that have qualified for the AYC do deserve to be there”.

Obuh also defended
his decision to include VVV Venlo striker, Ahmed Musa in his final
squad; a move that has been faulted by some fans.

“I also don’t see his inclusion in the U-20s as a retrogressive step
because he has been very much a part of the team” he explained. He
added: “If he could do well with the Super Eagles, I don’t see why he
cannot do same with the Flying Eagles”.

A
nine-man team yesterday inspected facilities at the Abuja National
Stadium ahead of the international friendly that is to take place
between Nigeria and Argentina on June 1.

The team which comprised organizers and sponsors of the match also checked out the hotels and other areas within the stadium.

Areas that were
inspected include the media centre, control rooms, media workstation,
camera stands, corporate suites, dressing rooms, and the main pitch, as
well as training pitches at the National Stadium and at the FIFA
technical centre.

The hotels – Transcorp Hilton and Sheraton Hotels – were also looked at.

The team was led by
Jairon Pachon who is the match agent. Others in the crew were Mark
Holden-Aikhomu (Control Risk Security project manager), Niall MacGinnis
who is director of security, Tony Oghoghorie, head of security,
Guinness Nigeria, which is one of the sponsors; Kevin Woods, logistics
director; Ian Watts, Supersport operations manager; Haastrup Femi,
Supersports crew leader; Neal Rawlings, project director and John
Walker, technical director.

They were
accompanied around the stadium by the stadium manager, Victor Osunsanmi
and some Nigeria Football Federation officials which included Idris
Adama who is assistant secretary general, Ademola Olajire, chief media
mfficer and Alizor Chuks, head of marketing.

The team is expected round off its inspection today.