Under the bright sunshine at the Etihad Stadium, Manchester City looked perfect, and they were. They showed off their sparkling soccer from the beginning, and all eyes were on who would take center stage this time.
Phil Foden took a step forward, sprinted, and nudged forward. It could have been Kevin De Bruyne, Erling Haaland, Josko Gvardiol… or literally anyone else except the goalkeeper, but they could ignore them if they wanted to. You probably won't be able to.
They are struggling yet beautiful winning machines. Winning four titles in a row is easy to say, but even with a lot of money invested and questions raised by the authorities, it's hard to do it, and do it in style like this. remains incredibly difficult to accomplish.
So, are they the greatest English club team of all time? Well, it's the same club but not the same team.
Four years ago, they had the likes of Raheem Sterling, Riyad Mahrez, Gabriel Jesus, Fernandinho, Ilkay Gundogan and Oleksandr Zinchenko. They were all abandoned.
At the center of this is Pep Guardiola, who has evolved his team and style as he continues to win. This is really great.
There have been very few mistakes on this trip, but with Cole Palmer slipping through their hands, mistakes can be made.
Thanks to everyone else, he's not there yet. Had Foden (23) and Palmer (22) been in the same team, they would have established his next decade of dominance.
Congratulations City, you're a joy to watch but as a former player I also know you're an absolute pain to play against.
Pat Nevin wrote: BBC Football Extra Newsletter
