But the presence of Barnsley, West Brom and Cardiff City in the last four was not greeted with universal joy.

I lost count of the number of times during radio commentary on the two Wembley games that I heard someone moan about the quality.

And Alan Hansen joined in yesterday, suggesting that anyone who had watched Manchester United at Middlesbrough before watching Cardiff against Barnsley would have noticed the difference in clash between the teams.

Really? Two sets of players earning the best part of £100,000-a-week each, and worth millions of pounds as assets, at the Riverside against two sets of Championship players on, at best, one-quarter of that and there was a difference in class! Who would have thought.

There is a serious point to this, however, and that is how much a constant diet of Premiership and Champions League football on television affects how those of us who regularly watch the game lower down the pyramid see the game.

Clearly television companies pay top dollar and are therefore entitled to show the very best teams.

But how are the likes of Huddersfield, Bradford and Halifax expected to compete in any way with what you can watch for £30 a month in your own front room?

There are even those who still attend live games whose view of events is tinted by what they see on the TV.

What those who usually do nothing more than peddle top flight football to us have to realise is that mediocre is what the rest of us watch week in, week out.

I am not complaining about the standard of football in the lower reaches - I used to have a season ticket at Prenton Park and loved every minute of it good and bad.

I just wish that the 'great and the good' who are privileged enough to only have to watch the top games would not ram down our throats how 'bad' they believe the football the rest of us watch is.

STILL on the FA Cup, the big question in the run up to the final will be whether or not Cardiff should represent the English FA in the UEFA Cup if they win.

It is a thorny issue brought about by a quirk of history that sees three Welsh sides competing in the English league system.

UEFA have announced that they are considering offering City a wildcard if they beat Portsmouth and, in my opinion, that seems only right.

The problem is, of course, that no one at the FA ever really contemplated a team from outside England winning the competition.

But that's the magic of this season's competition and the fairytale should be allowed to reach its logical conclusion.

HOW many English clubs will there be in the semi-finals of the Champions League?

Obviously one, with Liverpool entertaining Arsenal in the second leg of their clash, definitely two, with Manchester United well on top against Roma, and almost certainly three as Chelsea will be too strong for Fenerbahce.

There will only be one in the final, however and none will win the competition as Barcelona are the best team in Europe if not the world.