Manchester City’s domination of the domestic game is now so all-consuming that a historic fourth successive Premier League title is treated like an inevitable matter of routine.
City went into the final game of the season ahead for the sixth time in seven seasons needing only a win over West Ham United to lift the crown once more – and they duly delivered.
In doing so, Pep Guardiola’s all-conquering team once again proved they are the great untouchables of the Premier League.
They appear impervious to normal pressures – and the fact they have rewritten the record books will barely provoke excessive comment or deep-dive analysis. It was expected. The seismic shock would have been failure to complete their mission.
It is a stretch to say Manchester City have become so aligned with success that these unprecedented feats are met with a shrug of the shoulders, but the fact they have won 19 and drawn four of 23 league games since losing at Aston Villa in December has surprised very few.
This is where the elephant in the room must be mentioned because every City success will be accompanied by the narrative that they still face 115 Premier League charges for alleged financial irregularities – charges the club are at pains to stress they strenuously deny.
It is 15 months since those charges were levelled at the club. Unless and until there is clarity and a verdict, City will always be subjected to this outside noise and suspicion every time they win a trophy.
If the measure is football, however, there are no arguments.
Liverpool managed to overcome them in a 2019-20 season interrupted by the Covid pandemic, Jurgen Klopp’s outstanding side prevailing with a mammoth 18-point margin, taking the title back to Anfield for the first time in 30 years.
In those other years, Liverpool and, in the past two seasons, Arsenal have reached out but not quite been able to lay the decisive blow on this peerless, magnificent football machine.
Liverpool under Klopp have been outstanding but not outstanding enough. The same now applies to Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal.
City’s trademark end-of-season surge – the type of which broke Arsenal hearts as it did Liverpool’s before them – is now simply akin to muscle memory kicking in.
They denied Liverpool twice on the final day of the season, winning 4-1 at Brighton to win the title by one point in 2018-19 then, amid stunning drama and scenes of near hysteria, came from 2-0 down with 14 minutes left to beat Aston Villa in 2021-22 to pip Klopp’s side by a single point.
If this was a habit started by predecessors Roberto Mancini and Manuel Pellegrini in 2011-12 and 2013-14 respectively, Guardiola and his players have perfected it to something resembling normal service.
City’s team is sprinkled with world-class talent in all areas, from the lethal marksmanship of Erling Haaland to creator supreme Kevin de Bruyne, both now joined in that bracket by Phil Foden, with 27 goals from midfield this season.
