Leicester 1 Manchester U 2

Lei­cester City 1 Man­chester Uni­ted 2, Fil­bert Street, Eng­lish FA Cup Fifth Ro­und, Feb­ruary 14, 1976. Man­chester Uni­ted pro­gressed thro­ugh to the FA Cup Quart­er-Fi­nals af­ter de­feat­ing fel­low Fir­st Di­vi­sion club Lei­cester City 2-1 wi­th mid­field­ers Lou Ma­cari and Ger­ry Da­ly scor­ing a goal apiece.

Man­chester Uni­ted had elim­in­ated Sec­ond Di­vi­sion out­fit Ox­ford Uni­ted and Third Di­vi­sion op­pos­i­tion Pe­ter­bor­ough Uni­ted to reach the fifth ro­und of the FA Cup. Lei­cester City, mean­while, had dis­patched of Fir­st Di­vi­sion Shef­field Uni­ted and Third Di­vi­sion Bury to go thro­ugh to the next sta­ge of the com­pet­i­tion. Be­fore a crowd of 34,000 spec­tat­ors at Fil­bert Street, Man­chester Uni­ted put them­selves in­to an early lead eight min­utes af­ter the kick-off when Ste­ve Cop­pell sent a low pass in­to the pen­alty area where Lou Ma­cari pla­ced his fir­st time-shot pa­st Lei­cester goal­keeper Ma­rk Wal­ling­ton and in­to the bot­tom right-hand cor­ner of the net. Uni­ted near­ly net­ted a sec­ond goal a couple of min­utes pa­st the ha­lf-hour ma­rk as Stu­art Pear­son saw his clo­se ran­ge ef­fort cleared off the line by City de­fender Den­nis Rofe, on­ly for the vis­it­ors to score any­way three min­utes pa­st ha­lf-hour ma­rk when Ger­ry Da­ly power­ed the ball ho­me from in­side the eight­een-yard box. The Fil­berts push­ed hard fol­low­ing the in­ter­val and ma­naged to re­duce the de­fi­cit on the hour ma­rk as a free-kick from the one and on­ly Frank Wor­thing­ton was de­flec­ted in­to the back of the net by fel­low for­ward Bob Lee. Wi­th time tick­ing away in the fifth ro­und ga­me, Lei­cester City searched des­per­ately for an equal­ising goal, but the Man­chester Uni­ted de­fence kept their cool and held on for a fully de­served 2-1 vic­tory over the Mid­landers. Else­where in the FA Cup, Bol­ton Wan­derers and New­castle Uni­ted played out a en­thralling 3-3 draw at Burnden Park, Wolver­hampton Wan­derers out­classed Charl­ton Ath­let­ic to the tune of a 3-0 mar­gin at Mo­lineux cour­tesy of a hat-trick by John Richards, Nor­wich City suf­fered a 2-1 de­feat to Brad­ford City at Car­row Road, Sto­ke City were held to a 0-0 draw by Sun­der­land at Vic­tor­ia Gro­und, Der­by Coun­ty emer­ged 1-0 win­ners over South­end Uni­ted at Base­ball gro­und where Bru­ce Ri­och hit the win­ning goal for The Rams, Chel­sea suc­cumbed to a 3-2 de­feat at the hands of Lon­don neigh­bours Crys­tal Pal­ace in front of an at­tend­ance of more than 53,000 spec­tat­ors at Stam­ford Bridge, and West Brom­wich Al­bion and South­ampton drew 1-1 at The Hawthorns.

Af­ter over­com­ing Jim­my Bloomfield´s Lei­cester City 2-1 at Fil­bert Street, Man­chester Uni­ted would now face Wolver­hampton Wan­derers at Old Traf­ford in the quart­er-fi­nals. This would be the fir­st meet­ing be­tween Man­chester Uni­ted and Wolver­hampton in the FA Cup since the 13th of Jan­uary 1973 when Wan­derers be­at The Reds 1-0 at Mo­lineux in the third ro­und wi­th a goal from cap­tain and mid­fielder Mi­ke Bai­ley in the sec­ond min­ute. In oth­er draws, Crys­tal Pal­ace would be tak­ing on either Sun­der­land or Sto­ke City away, Brad­ford City would find them­selves up ag­ainst either South­ampton or West Brom­wich Al­bion at Val­ley Parade, and Der­by Coun­ty would lock horns wi­th either New­castle Uni­ted or Bol­ton Wan­derers at Base­ball Gro­und. Lei­cester City Te­am: Ma­rk Wal­ling­ton, Den­nis Rofe, Ste­ve Whit­worth, Alan Wool­lett, Jeff Block­ley, Ste­ve Kem­ber, Keith Weller, Bob Lee, Chris Gar­land, Bri­an Alder­son, Frank Wor­thing­ton. Sub­sti­tute: Jon Sam­mels. Man­chester Uni­ted Te­am: Al­ex Step­ney, Al­ex For­syth, Stew­art Hou­s­ton, Mar­tin Bu­chan, Bri­an Green­hoff, Sam­my Mc­Ilroy, Ste­ve Cop­pell, Ger­ry Da­ly, Stu­art Pear­son, Lou Ma­cari, Gor­don Hill. Sub­sti­tute: Da­vid McCreery.

Gerry Daly Quickfacts

An of­fens­ive-minded mid­fielder, Ger­ry Da­ly re­gistered his fir­st com­pet­it­ive goal for Man­chester Uni­ted in a 3-1 Fir­st Di­vi­sion tri­umph over Chel­sea at Stam­ford Bridge on the 30th of Mar­ch 1974.

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