No Regrets

So much contradiction in the papers today, often in the same articles. The team selection was to blame for the defeat and yet we were the better team, only denied by the referee "not seeing" a foul in the area, and yet Everton deserved to win becuase ... they turned up, from what I can gather in the reports.
Take this Daily Star report. First sentence:

THE right team made it to the FA Cup Final – but only just.

The reason?

Fergie has only himself to blame.

He obviously feels that he has more important competitions to focus on like the Premier League and European Cup because the strength of the team he fielded yesterday was a disgrace.

He put out a reserve side in a showpiece game which deserved better.

Fine so far, let's continue and get to the heart of the matter:

The only real problem was that Everton could not overcome their nerves and show the courage – until the end – to take advantage.
This was an appalling game of football basically because United were so disjointed, and Everton so cautious and lacking any quality or composure.
In the end the whole of the 90 minutes came down to one disputed penalty which should have been given to United.

Everton lacked "any quality or composure" and yet the "right team made it to the FA Cup Final"? Not only that but the report explicitly states that the game "came down to one disputed penalty which should have been given to United". I think that first sentence needs changing to

THE wrong team made it to the FA Cup Final – but only just.

As for that penalty decision, Jesus. Literally everyone thought it a penalty. David Moyes:

“My first thought was it looked a penalty. After looking at it again, if it had been me as the manager, I would have been shouting for it.”

Phil Jagielka, who made the challenge:

“I touched him, but I’m not sure how much that caused him to go down. Thankfully the penalty was not given.

“Maybe that was a bit of luck but we will take that.”

And every single paper's report (bar Patrick Barclay in The Times, I'm sure he has his own reasons...). For example:

Only Riley can explain his thought process when Jagielka, United’s eventual nemesis, clipped Danny Welbeck’s heels after 67 minutes. Penalty. Absolute nailed-on penalty. No question. Laughably, Riley waved play on. English football boasts some good referees. Chris Foy and Martin Atkinson are enjoying fine seasons while Howard Webb remains outstanding, but Riley should not be allowed games as important as this.

Welbeck was through on goal, so why on earth would he throw himself to Wembley’s rutted surface?

And:

There were six officials at Wembley and still they got the one key decision wrong.

Long before this mind-numbing war of attrition was reduced to a lottery, Manchester United had their claims for a perfectly good penalty ignored.

Just about every member of the largest crowd in FA Cup semi-final history saw Phil Jagielka send Danny Welbeck crashing to the ground in the 68th minute and so did an incensed Sir Alex Ferguson.

But on a weekend when a sixth official was named, somewhat controversially, by the FA, Mike Riley and his colleagues provided yet more ammunition for those who consider it more prudent to employ modern technology before extra bodies.

So I don't really know why, in every single paper they all reckon Everton deserved to win, and why they all blame the team selection. Of course I do know, none of them wanted us to win anyway. No matter what team was out they'd have found a reason to slag us off. Martin Samuel at least admits this, good for the game that Everton are in the final, etc., etc., and at least has the decency not to hide behind any Everton were the better team rubbish. He just didn't want us to win:

The best team lost but the better team won. How so? Well, Manchester United were the best team for the duration of the match and should have had a penalty which would have dispensed with the need for extra time, let alone penalties.

Yet it was better that Everton returned to Wembley, for all sorts of reasons, but mainly because winning the FA Cup means more to a club labouring in the slipstream of the elite than it does to the overachieving champions of England, Europe and the world.

And there you have it. Sod the game on the pitch, let's just hope Man Utd lose.
David Pleat sums everything up pretty well by using his game analysis to tell us why Everton were so rubbish.
Daniel Taylor criticises the line-up and blames Sir Alex without really considering that we should have won the game anyway.
The Mirror blame Sir Alex for singlehandedly ruining the FA Cup:

Wayne Rooney may have been injured, but leaving Cristiano Ronaldo in Manchester and starting with a line-up top-heavy with fringe and reserve players showed contempt for Everton, United's travelling fans and the heritage of the competition.

Much has been done in recent years to restore the magic of the FA Cup, but yesterday Fergie did his best to put it back in the shadows. While he had indicated he would make wholesale changes to keep his players fresh for the challenge on three fronts, nobody could have predicted he would leave out so many of his established stars.

And I do like Sir Alex's words after the game on his team selection:

“We had a team picked after Wednesday’s game, but when I saw the pitch yesterday I didn’t want to go into extra time with our strongest squad,” Ferguson said. “We had to take the bold decision of going with the younger ones with energy, confidence and a good temperament. This club is built on giving younger players opportunities, they got that today and didn’t disappoint.

“Berbatov and [Paul] Scholes would have started, possibly [Patrice] Evra. But the more I thought about it, the more I thought it was the right thing to do. The only disappointment is they were in a losing team.”

No regrets. It was certainly bold and the description, "energy, confidence and a good temperament" says it all really. Plus if you consider the player who missed the first penalty in laughable (if it wasn't so bloody important) fashion, it might have been better if at least one younger player had still been on at the end...
Some more words from Sir Alex:

"Once we made our mind up, I was quite enthusiastic about it. It was the right thing to do. It was good for them." ...
"The most important thing is that I now know that, in the run-in, those young players of mine can play in any game, ability-wise.
"(Danny) Welbeck and (Federico) Macheda were absolutely outstanding and that is a big plus point. We have some massive games coming up now and we have the squad to cope with it."

And as Sam Wallace points out:

Ferguson's team selection was the sensation of the afternoon, much more so than anything that took place on the pitch.

Exactly. What would everyone had had to write about if we'd fielded a stronger team and much the same game had ensued...