Manchester City are through to face Chelsea in The Final of The FA Youth Cup after an aggregate victory over Leicester City in the last four.
An undaunted Leicester U18s side showed fight but lost 2-1 at home to City, falling 5-1 on aggregate to the young Citizens.
Needing to turn around a 3-0 deficit from the first leg, the plucky young Foxes knew they had their work cut out with goals at the top of the agenda.
Leicester City 1-2 Manchester City
The FA Youth Cup
Semi-Final second leg
Wednesday 8 April
King Power Stadium, Leicester City FC
Leicester pulled one back late on only to succumb to another defeat with two late strikes from the visitors.
A high-tempo Man City side tested their resolve early on, winning a series of early corners and testing Leicester goalkeeper Max Smith-Varnham with a 25-yard blast in the fifth minute.
The pressure continued, as Leicester seemed intent to soak up everything Man City could throw at them, but the Foxes’ sharp counter-attack earned them their first corner of the match three minutes later.
The ensuing set piece was headed on target by Darnell Johnson, but was caught comfortably by City goalkeeper Christian Kjetil-Haug - a phase of play that seemed to be the story of the match for Leicester, who mustered little in the way of dangerous attacking chances.
The first half ended goalless, but was dictated by piercing wide play from both teams, particularly from the intrepid Brandon Barker, City’s Academy Players’ Player of the Year last campaign. His dogged runs down the left-hand side left the Foxes scrambling at times.
The second 45 minutes brought more of the same muted action with both teams trying to exploit space but Manchester City were able to hold Leicester at bay.
With time quickly running out, a tangle of bodies in the box during a Leicester corner gave the hosts hope as the referee pointed to the spot. Layton Ndukwu stepped up and confidently passed the ball into the bottom right corner to make it 1-0 on the night.
However, Leicester couldn’t find any more goals in the remaining 10 minutes and their frustrations were compounded; surrendering a 90th-minute tap-in to substitute Isaac Buckley-Ricketts and a last gasp penalty drilled home by City's best player on the night, Barker.
With resounding results so far in the competition, Manchester City now face their sternest test yet as they take on an in-form Chelsea side in The Final.
City will host the first leg at the Etihad Stadium on Monday 20 April before going to Stamford Bridge for the return leg a week later.
Leicester City: 1 Max Smith-Varnham; 2 Matty Miles, 3 Ben Chilwell (C), 4 Hamza Choudhury, 5 Cedric Kipre; 6 Darnell Johnson, 7 Kyle Bailey, 8 Brandon Fox, 9 Keenan King; 10 Danny Rowe, 11 Layton Nduku.
Substitutes: 15 Harvey Barnes on for Bailey 63, 16 Admiral Muskwe for Rowe 74.
Substitutes not used: Josh Knight, Max Bramley, Tomas Dombrauskis.
Goals: Ndukwu (pen, 69)
Manchester City: 1 Christian Kjetil-Haug; 2 Pablo Maffeo, 3 Cameron Humphreys-Grant, 4 Charlie Olver, Angelino; 6 Kean Bryan (C), 7 Aaron Nemane, 8 Marcus Wood, 9 Bersant Celina; 10 Manuel Garcia, 11 Brandon Barker.
Substitutes: 16 Isaac Buckley-Ricketts for Wood 45, 12 Callum Bullock for Bryan 90+2.
Substitutes not used: 13 Charlie Albinson, 14 Paolo Fernandes Cantin, 15 Javairo Dilrosun.
Goals: Buckley-Ricketts 90, Barker (pen, 90+5)
