Chelsea beat Manchester City to win women's FA Cup in front of record crowd

Chelsea players celebrate one of their goals in the women's FA Cup final against Manchester City.
(Image credit: Getty Images)

Sam Kerr scored twice for Chelsea's women in a thrilling extra-time win for the Blues over Manchester City in the Vitality FA Cup final on Sunday, watched by a record crowd at Wembley.

Around 55,000 fans were expected for the match on Sunday, but the official attendance was later confirmed to be slightly lower as 49,094 watched the showpiece fixture.

That was still a new record, though, beating the previous high in a women's FA Cup final of 45,423 from 2018.

The game itself was an exciting one, with Chelsea ahead through Kerr after 33 minutes, but pegged back as City levelled with a Lauren Hemp goal before half-time.

Erin Cuthbert then put the WSL winners back in front after 63 minutes, but again City came back to force extra time as Hayley Raso equalised just before the end.

That set up an exciting period of extra time in an FA Cup final for the second day in a row, after Liverpool beat Chelsea on penalties in the men's match on Saturday, although there was no shortage of goals in this fixture.

In the end it was down to Kerr to settle it, her deflected strike in the 99th minute handing Chelsea an extra-time win and making it eight goals for the impressive Australian in four domestic cup finals for the Blues.

Ben Hayward
Weekend editor

Ben Hayward is a European football writer and Tottenham Hotspur fan with over 15 years’ experience, he has covered games all over the world - including three World Cups, several Champions League finals, Euros, Copa America - and has spent much of that time in Spain. Ben speaks English and Spanish, currently dividing his time between Barcelona and London, covering all the big talking points of the weekend on FFT: he’s also written several list features and interviewed Guglielmo Vicario for the magazine.