Britain's Prince William, Duke of Cambridge gives the FA Cup to Leicester City's Kasper Schmeichel (Source: Reuters) Leicester City captain Kasper Schmeichel hailed the Foxes’ first FA Cup triumph as a dream come true on Saturday as manager Brendan Rodgers paid tribute to the collective spirit of his club.
Leicester beat Chelsea 1-0 thanks to a thunderous long-range shot by Youri Tielemans and also two sensational saves by Schmeichel.
“It’s what dreams are made of. I’ve dreamt of this since I was a child. We’ve talked about wanting to win trophies,” said Schmeichel, whose father Peter won the FA Cup three times with Manchester United.
“The performance today, the grit and determination, I’m so proud of everybody, everybody’s contributed to get to the final, everybody’s played, everybody’s been sensational,” Schmeichel told BBC television.
Dreamt of this moment as a boy. Dreams come true. So proud of this team. FA Cup winners 2021 🏆🦊 pic.twitter.com/UtJVjE6LDM
— Kasper Schmeichel (@kschmeichel1) May 15, 2021
“All the team behind the team, all the medical staff, everyone. That’s why when you work together and you do things properly and you have an internal belief that’s what you can achieve.”
Rodgers said he had not been aware that Leicester, Premier League champions in 2015-16 as underdogs, had never won the FA Cup until he joined the club in 2019.”It’s a real collective effort at Leicester City,” said the Northern Irishman.
“The success of this team and this club is getting to positions like this and competing.”The so-called bigger clubs in the country are expected to win the trophies, our success is competing and if we can perform like today we can then go and win,” he added.
Chelsea still have a Champions League final against Manchester City to come and were one of six Premier League clubs involved in plans for a closed European Super League that collapsed in the face of widespread outcry.
“Youri’s goal was like an old-school FA cup-winning goal but also Kasper Schmeichel’s save, those are the special moments you need in games,” said Rodgers.
“Overall I thought we were the better team, pressed the game really well, super aggressive… we were always a threat with the ball. Chelsea are an amazing team, that’s why they’re in the Champions League final, but I thought we deserved it.”
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