Manchester City 2-0 Aston Villa

Aston Villa bowed out of the Women’s FA Cup at the quarter-final stage this afternoon as they were beaten 2-0 by Manchester City at the Joie Stadium.

Second-half goals from Khadija Shaw and Jess Park secured the win for City despite a valiant and improved display from the Villans.

Natalia Arroyo made four changes to her side that lost 2-0 to Everton last weekend as she brought Paula Tomàs, Lucy Parker, Ebony Salmon and Gabi Nunes into the starting 11.

Villa had to dig deep and defend early on inside the opening stages of the fixture as City came out on the front foot.

Park whipped a dangerous cross deep into the box searching for Shaw in the ninth minute, but Sabrina D’Angelo read the ball well and bravely collected it.

The home side broke quickly into the Villa half two minutes later as Shaw received the ball inside the area before drilling a shot goalwards, but her effort rolled just wide of the post.

Vivianne Miedema teed up two shots on goal moments later as she tried her luck from distance but both times her efforts flew wide of the target.

Jill Roord stepped up next for the hosts as she glided through the box and then hit a low effort along the grass towards goal, but D’Angelo remained firm in between the sticks to get down to collect the ball.

Villa then began to settle into the contest and started to push the home side on the attack as they also went in search of the opening goal.

The best opportunity of the first-half fell to the Villans as Nunes rolled a terrific defence splitting pass through the final third and into Salmon’s path who carried the ball goalwards before smashing her shot but her strike was pushed over the bar.

Sarah Mayling was called into action immediately after the restart as she got down to strongly block a dangerous shot from Miedema inside the area.

But Villa weren’t able to pick up from where the left off just after the break as the home side took the lead in the 53^rd minute.

Mary Fowler curled a well-weighted pass around the Villa defence and into the path of Shaw who took a touch before slipping a shot under the keeper.

Park doubled her side’s lead in the 71^st minute as she all but sealed City’s spot in the semi-finals.

Miedema pounced on the ball inside the final third before slipping a pass through to Park who picked out the bottom left hand corner of goal with a calm finish.

Villa were determined to not let City add another goal to their tally and to remain in the tie as they continued to defend strongly inside their box.

Jill Baijings, who captained the side this afternoon, first got down to strongly block a shot from Shaw in the 77^th minute just before D’Angelo superbly stretched out to punch clear the follow up effort from Park.

Arroyo used all her substitutions in the closing stages of the game as Villa upped their fight to pull themselves back into the game but efforts from Rachel Daly and Salmon fell wide of the target and time eventually ran out for the side.