Manchester City’s Billionaires proved too much for the young guns of Arsenal as they blew them away in a three goal second half display.

Goals from Carlos Tevez, Shaun Wright Phillips and Vladimir Weiss scored to set up a mouthwatering Semi Final against local neighbours and Champions United.

The first leg will be played at the City of Manchester stadium on the fourth of January and it looks sure to be a grudge match for the Blue half of Manchester.

After one of the most exciting derbies in history, City will undoubtedly want payback for the 4-3 defeat at Old Trafford after Ferguson’s team scored in the seventh minute of a criminally long extra stoppage time period.

United themselves booked their place in the semis with a victory over

Elsewhere, Portsmouth new boss Avram Grant watched his side lose yet again, this time at the hands of Aston Villa.

Although Pompey went ahead, through a Stilian Petrov own goal, goals form Emile Heskey, James Milner and Stewart Downing silenced the Fratton Park faithful. Veteran Nigerian striker Kanu added a faint hope on 87 minutes

before Ashley Young settled the Villa fans nerves and sent the Midlands club through to the next round.

They will face the winners of the tie of the round in Blackburn, who pulled off a shock penalty shoot out victory out of the hat. New signing Kakuta missed the vital penalty as Chelsea were stunned by the Lancashire side.

The score had been tied at 3-3 before a dramatic penalty shoot out was settled when

THE DRAW

MANCHESTER CITY v MANCHESTER UNITED

BLACKBURN ROVERS v ASTON VILLA

1st Leg matches due to be played week commencing 4th January 2010.

2nd Leg matches due to be played week commencing 18th January 2010.

BOOKIES’ FAVOURITES

The bookmakers have made Manchester United odds on favourites, but if City do manage to beat them then look for a City-Villa final and another possible penalty shoot out between two evenly matched sides.

Watching Paul Merson’s latest attack on Manchester City sent me back almost a decade in time to the days of Harry Enfield and his grotesque character ‘Loads a Money’.

How this ultra biased Gunner is still employed by Sky Sports is just a mystery to millions of watching fans across the globe.

It certainly isn’t for his eloquence of speech as the washed up Ex- England star stumbles through yet another incomprehensible utterance as though he’s just come back from lunch at the local pub.

The only conclusion I can think for the Toad of Powder Hall still being in a prime time television job is that he amuses host Jeff Spelling and the other pundits so much that they just can’t bear to be without him.

In fact, the Ex-England star looks so much like the Toad of Toad Hall in a monkey suit that maybe thousands of Children worldwide are to blame for a rise in viewing figures as they believe his segment to be a continuation of children’s programming.

In Toad’s latest instalment he analyses Man City’s performance against Hull City. In a game that City dominated but couldn’t kill off, Hull were awarded a penalty to level the score and steal a point.

When asked about the Sky Blues, Merson labelled the Blues as a coach of Hollywood superstars who had failed at top four clubs and were now cracking under the pressure of failing to deliver!

Now I don’t know about you Paul, but wasn’t Carlos Tevez a big hit and winner at Man United? Wasn’t Kolo Toure the last remaining member of ‘The Invincibles’ arguably the best Arsenal team of the last 30 years?

The next pearl of wisdom that made it’s way out of this sorry excuse for a man’s mouth was the bitterest attack on the Blues to date.

“I look at Man City’s team and not one of them could get into a top four side…”

So astounded were Matt Le Tissier and the other pundits at what was coming out of the Buffoon’s mouth, they were rendered speechless.

The silence was eventually broken by the tactful Stelling, sounding like a father to his teenage son, suggesting that Merson was exaggerating again and that of course Shay Given was good enough.

Merson’s response was typical of a man who has long since made brain-to-tongue communication redundant in his world.

“He wouldn’t get in ahead of Cech at Chelsea, but I’d ‘av ‘im at Arsenal…”

Are Arsenal not a top four side then Paul? The analytical genius obviously has a problem with City and one wonders if it is over more than just the Adebayor issue.

With a full three and a half minutes to talk, there is no shortage of material to illustrate how biased this man is and you just have to see it to believe it for yourself.

Arsenal manager, Arsene Wenger, says that banning football clubs from buying players under the age of 18 will make the transfer situation worse and not better. Wenger’s point is based on the fact that football clubs are businesses and established organizations.

Banning clubs from buying players may lead to complications when it comes to agents who may be presented with the opportunity of buying all rights connected to a player, which could prompt a repeat of the Carlos Tevez saga that eventually saw West Ham United paying a settlement of £30 million to Sheffield United.

Wenger said: “If you ban players from moving before the age of 18, you know what will happen? The player will be sold anyway. To whom? To agents. At what age? At 13, 14. Where will they go? Not to top-level clubs with top-level education. They will go to clubs who have been bought by business people, of a very low level, and will stay there until the age of 18 waiting to be sold. The money will go out of the game.”

“If your players cannot move to the best clubs, I believe they will not improve. If you have a child who is a good musician, what is your first reaction? It is to put it into a good music school, not in an average one. So why should that not happen in football? If a player goes to Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United, it is all [above board] and he gets a good education.”

“Clubs will just make future agreements with the clubs to sign them at 18 when they are 16. Are they really going to wait? England is in a weak position for taking young players because they inflict a big handicap on themselves by the fact that they have no access to Asian players, no access to South American players, no access to African players [because of work permit regulations].”

Wenger’s critics will say that the Frenchman will react badly to the possibility of a ban because his football philosophy has been based on buying young players over the last two or three seasons and now that it is under threat he will say any thing to stop it from happening.

Football is a very lucrative business and there are a lot of people in the game who are just trying to make a few extra pounds by capitalizing on the inexperience of a lot of younger players.