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United face Villa at Wembley

Author: Lynda Collins
Date: 28/02/2010
Football betting

Manchester United will be keen to retain their Carling Cup crown on Sunday afternoon at Wembley but they must overcome five-time winners Aston Villa for the honours in this season's final.

It will be a re-run of the 1994 event and it is the Midlanders that can look back to that day with delight as they grabbed a fine 3-1 success.

Villa also went on to win the competition two years later, smashing Leeds United 3-0 as they claimed the trophy for the fifth time in their history.

They are now just two victories behind Liverpool, who hold the record with seven titles, in the competition that was first staged in 1967 with Queens Park Rangers seeing off the challenge of West Bromwich Albion 3-2 in the inaugural showpiece.

Martin O'Neill's side made it to Wembley by beating Cardiff City, Sunderland, Portsmouth and Blackburn Rovers while United's route to the final has seen them emerge victorious from matches against Wolves, Barnsley, Spurs and Manchester City in an epic two-legged semi-final.

The Red Devils are the clear online sportsbook favourites to win the prize this season but it will be interesting to see if Sir Alex Ferguson continues to place his faith in his second-string players who have played in most of this season's Carling Cup fixtures.

The two teams have met twice in the Premier League already this season with Villa just having the edge.

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In December they secured a famous 1-0 victory when Gabriel Agbonlahor's first-half goal ensured they won at Old Trafford for the first time in 27 years.

It also ended a 24-game winless sequence for Villa in all competitions against Sir Alex Ferguson's side and they followed it up earlier this month with a less impressive performance in a 1-1 draw at Villa Park.

On that occasion, O'Neill's team were fortunate to escape with a point despite playing against ten men for more than an hour following Nani's dismissal for a two-footed lunge on Stiliyan Petrov.

That red card means Nani misses the Wembley final as he is serving the final game of his three-match suspension.

Rio Ferdinand is available after completing his four-match ban but he has suffered an injury setback and will miss out on Sunday as well as England's friendly clash against Egypt on Wednesday.

Ryan Giggs (arm), John O'Shea (thigh) and Owen Hargreaves (knee) all miss out for United while Villa will also be without three injured players - Nigel Reo-Coker, Marlon Harewood (both foot) and Wilfred Bouma (ankle).

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