The Hindu : Sport / Football : Man United, Barca enter semifinals

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Man United, Barca enter semifinals

LONDON: Manchester United and Barcelona wrapped up their places in the Champions League football semifinals on Tuesday as they progressed at the expense of Chelsea and Shakhtar Donetsk respectively.

United earned its place in the last four with a 2-1 victory over Chelsea — which ended the match with 10 men after Ramires was sent off in the second-half — and a 3-1 triumph on aggregate.

United's goals came from Javier Hernandez and Korean Park Ji-Sung.

Barcelona — reaching the semifinals for a record fourth successive time — inflicted the first home defeat in European competition on 2009 UEFA Cup winner Shakhtar since it lost to Sporting Lisbon in October, 2008 as Lionel Messi scored the only goal of the game to seal a 6-1 aggregate victory.

Messi's goal

Messi's goal, his 48th of the campaign and yet another landmark for the two-time World Player of the Year as it is a club record for a season, sets it up for a likely semifinal with Real Madrid, which takes a 4-0 lead to Spurs in Wednesday's clash.

It was no surprise that Ancelotti brought on Didier Drogba was brought in for Fernando Torres at half-time, but the damage had been done with Hernandez's first-half goal after fine work by Ryan Giggs and John O'Shea having separated the sides.

Drogba gave the team hope of pulling off a remarkable win in the 77th-minute, but its hopes were dashed a minute later as another sublime pass by Giggs found Park and he shot past Cech into the far corner.

The results: Quarterfinal second leg: At Manchester: Manchester United 2 (Hernandez 43, Park 78) bt Chelsea 1 (Drogba 77). Manchester United wins 3-1 on aggregate.

At Donetsk: Shakhtar Donetsk 0 lost to Barcelona 1 (Messi 43). Barcelona wins 6-1 on aggregate . — AFP

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