Chelsea will face London rivals Tottenham in next month's League Cup final after crushing Everton's dream of a first domestic final appearance in eight years on Wednesday.
Joe Cole's well-taken strike left Everton with little prospect of overturning their 2-1 first-leg deficit at Goodison Park.
An uninspiring contest was at least graced by a decisive moment of real quality, Cole gathering Florent Malouda's long diagonal pass with a superb first touch before stroking the ball past Everton goalkeeper Tim Howard.
The goal-scorer admitted the win had required a disciplined performance from him and him team-mates.
"Everton are a top side, all credit to them, they always give us a great game but we wanted to win and we showed that," Cole said. "We've been on the end of a few bad semi-final experiences in Liverpool but it will be a nice flight home tonight. It was a good performance."
Chelsea boss Avram Grant paid tribute to the way his line-up had coped with the absence of over half his first choice line-up.
"It's a big test of character and the players are doing a great job," Grant said. "I said we had a good squad. What they did today and in the last month was amazing."
Everton's need to overturn their first-leg deficit ensured a frantic start to proceedings, although real chances were thin on the ground as the home side failed to take their cue from their fired-up supporters.
Petr Cech got down smartly to his left to keep out a Joleon Lescott header from Mikel Arteta's corner after only nine minutes, but Chelsea's deliberate slowing of the pace soon began to have an impact on the tempo of the contest.
With Nicolas Anelka operating as a sole forward and the visitors' back four dropping very deep, Chelsea had few problems coping with their hosts' limited attempts to break them down.
And gradually it was the Londoners who began to dominate proceedings, with Anelka testing Howard with a low drive just before the half hour mark and Malouda then lifting a good chance over the bar from 12m.
There was another warning shot for Everton just after the break, when Anelka found space in the box for a shot that was deflected onto the bar by Phil Jagielka.
Everton finally began to threaten with Phil Neville forcing a sharp save from Cech when he connected with a low corner from Arteta.
Cech then denied Jagielka with his feet after the midfielder had attempted to direct Leon Osman's mishit shot goalwards with a clever back-heel.
Suddenly it seemed as if Everton might just be on the brink of finding the inspiration they needed but had lacked for the opening hour of the match.
Instead, it was Cole who applied the killer blow for Chelsea after a superbly judged long ball by Malouda from wide on the left.
The England midfielder's superb control and equally assured right-foot finish did the rest and gave Chelsea an unassailable 3-1 aggregate lead.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but