UK Edition
Swansea City rule out complaint over absent VAR in FA Cup defeat against Manchester City
Swansea City have ruled out a complaint against the Football Association, despite saying the club is "in the dark" over the controversial decision to deprive them of a video assistant referee which would have swung this knife-edge quarter-final in their favour.
The Liberty Stadium is easily equipped to use the technology, but the FA informed the club prior to this pulsating encounter that it would be sticking with its policy to only use it only at Premier League grounds for cup weekends.
With VAR in use for the two other Saturday quarter-finals, its absence in South Wales had perplexed Pep Guardiola, even though his side had benefited thanks to two dubious second-half goals. A soft penalty and then an offside header from Sergio Aguero just two minutes later dragged the carpet from under the Welsh side, who been leading 2-0 for more than an hour.
Guardiola said sorry afterwards, and Swansea supporters raged. However, as the dust settles, the club concluded it would be wasting its time in complaining to the FA. "We're proud of the performance from our team," a senior club source said. "It was a disappointing decision but there's no point in showing sour grapes."
The last-gasp Aguero winner had been so cruel on the Welsh side and got the better of a small sections of home fans, for whom the beer had been flowing since Wales triumphed in the Six Nations earlier. Afterwards, South Wales Police arrested three male youths for running onto the pitch. Following a week in which pitch invasions have been such a talking point in football, the police match commander, Superintendent Steve Jones, said the fans would be "dealt with robustly."
It was the cruellest of FA Cup exits for a Swansea side who had left the Liberty Stadium rocking after rampaging into a 2-0 lead.
The hosts weathered a deluge of early attacks by the Premier League champions before shocking them when Connor Roberts cut in off the right flank after 19 minutes and jinked inside before tumbling down under the clumsy intervention of Fabian Delph. Matt Grimes had stepped up to send a venomous penalty beyond Ederson's right side.
The visiting billionaires - who had failed to convert two earlier chances for Riyad Mahrez and Leroy Sane - were temporarily stunned into submission, and life would get even sweeter for the hosts 10 minutes later with a stylish goal not all that far from the Guardiola school of attacking play.
Goalkeeper Kristoffer Nordfeldt started the sweeping move, finding the rapid feet of Daniel James, who can count himself among a very elite crowd to have made Kyle Walker look a slouch. Dancing inside from the left, James's low pass was flicked into the path of the former Manchester City playmaker Bersant Celina, who exorcised all the demons of his rejection by the club as he sent the sweetest of curling strikes beyond Ederson.
However, there was a collective groan 15 minutes after the restart as Guardiola, who had looked ready to erupt with rage by the break, brought out the big guns, with first Raheem Sterling and then Aguero coming off the bench.
The Argentine would cause havoc within minutes and on his second foray into the 18-yard box, his deflected strike bounced into the path of Bernado Silva who rifled home to spark the most nervous of remaining half hours.
Torrential rain fell harder as cheers turned to despair for Graham Potter's men. Cameron Carter-Vickers lunged in on a fresh-legged Sterling and Aguero duly converted the penalty, albeit via the post and then off the back of Nordfeldt. Then, just two minutes before time Aguero, the man they had been fearing most, struck again.
The quadruple dream lives on for City but Guardiola said afterwards he was "tired". He can count himself lucky that both he and Aguero will be able to put their feet up over the next week or so as the Argentine is not on duty in the international break.