FA Cup: Manchester City wins English treble of league title, domestic cups

Manchester City wins the FA Cup to become the first team to win the English treble of league title and both domestic cups.

Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany (C) lifts the winner's trophy as the players celebrate victory. Picture: AFP.

Manchester City has crushed Watford 6-0 in the FA Cup final to become the first team to win the English treble of league title and both domestic cups in the most emphatic way imaginable.

The victory on Saturday matched the competition’s record final win — set when Bury beat Derby County 116 years ago — and was the perfect end to an amazing season for unarguably one of the finest teams to grace the long history of the English game.

Coming after they retained the Premier League title last week and won the League Cup in a penalty shootout over Chelsea, City’s sixth FA Cup triumph made them the eighth team to win the prized League and FA Cup double and first since Chelsea in 2010.

They also scored 169 goals in 61 games this season, beating their own previous best of 156.

“It was an incredible final for us and we have finished an incredible year,” City manager Pep Guardiola said.

“To all the people at the club a big congratulations, especially the players because they are the reason why we have won these titles.”

Danilo of Manchester City lifts the trophy following the FA Cup Final match. Picture: Getty Images.

City led 2-0 at halftime through David Silva and Sterling and effectively sealed the deal when Kevin de Bruyne came off the bench to smash in the third after 61 minutes.

Gabriel Jesus slotted the fourth before Sterling, who was brought up in Wembley, took centre stage with two more in the last 10 minutes to become the first player to score an FA Cup final hat-trick since Stan Mortensen in 1953 when Blackpool beat Bolton 4-3 in the “Matthews Final”.

“I grew up here and saw this stadium get built. It’s a massive dream come true to win trophies here,” said the England winger.

“It shows what the manager is building here. He said we needed to get the mentality right and we did that and did it exceptionally well.”

“What a season,” City captain Vincent Kompany said. “What a tremendous club.”

Other than one early chance for Roberto Pereyra, Watford never looked remotely capable of ending their 30-year winless run against City in their second appearance in the final having lost to Everton in 1984.

“We knew we had to play the perfect game and started well but they were better, congratulations to them,” said Watford coach Javi Gracia, whose team finished 11th in the league, 48 points behind the champions.

After also winning the Premier League and League Cup last season, City have now lifted five of the past six available domestic trophies.

The one blip is their failure to again make even the semi-finals of the Champions League — something that will nag at manager Pep Guardiola throughout the summer but ensure he and his team come back full of vigour in August. “What a team this is,” said Bernardo Silva.

“Now it is time to rest, to celebrate and next season we will try and win it all again.”

But the unprecedented achievement by football’s costliest squad comes against the backdrop of investigations into City’s compliance into football’s spending rules that could lead to the Abu Dhabi-owned team being banned from the Champions League.

More than $1 billion has been spent on transfer fees alone since 2008 when Sheikh Mansour bought a team that was more accustomed to playing in lower leagues than lifting trophies.

It wasn’t until 2011 that City ended a 35-year trophy drought by winning the FA Cup.

Now City is the undisputed power of English football — a status it claimed from neighbour Manchester United.

“It’s one of the best seasons I have experienced as a manager,” said Guardiola, who won titles previously at Barcelona and Bayern Munich.

Reuters, AP