It was a wonderful day all in all. Torture in the second -half when Blackburn came back strongly and created the best chances and ultimately equalised Frank Lampard's sublime first-half opener after a wonderful through ball from Michael Ballack.
Petr Cech showed why he IS the BEST goalkeeper in the World with a man of the match performance and Michael Ballack who couldn't head a ball all afternoon had probably his most strongest game for Chelsea and became a hero, by scoring the winner ten minutes from the end of extra-time
A wonderful day which started for yours truly at 5am and ended at 2am this morning.
We decided to let someone else take the stresses and strains of the driving so we took the coach, had a relaxing journey up arriving at Old Trafford at around 1pm - some three hours before kick-off.
But it gave lots of time to take in the atmosphere, soak up the sun and walk around the perimeter of stadium three times whilst mixing in with the supporters of Blackburn Rovers. The police were out in force and they made no attempt to stop supporters mingling with each other around the outside of the stadium.
We saw the two teams arrive and caught brief glimpses of all the players as they disembarked and made the short walk to the dressing room entrance. I got real close up to Chelsea's owner Mr Abramovich as he made his way into the stadium and then we were set.
Not the one for entering a stadium too early, the draw of Old Trafford makes that scenario that more difficult to resist and once you are inside you just cannot do anything more but admire the stadium in all its finery and regalia.
Forget the fact Old Trafford is the home of our nearest rivals. Old Trafford is simply a MUST visit stadium.
Unfortunately the downside of yesterday's wonderful day was the size of the crowd. Old Trafford can accommodate 76,000, sadly the attendance was ONLY 50,559. Although the atmosphere was GREAT, the atmosphere was 'lost' with so many empty seats. This game could have been staged at Villa Park and Villa Park could have comfortably held two semi-final matches in two days.
But the 'big-wigs' at the FA share no concern or consideration for the 'average' football fan and today the FA has announced ticket prices for the FA Cup Final at the new Wembley on May 19th.
The prices are £35, £60, £80, £90 with a limited amount of tickets priced at £17.50 for U16s. WOW whooppeedo!!!