Barring some unthinkable screw-up, Manchester City should be heading to the quarter finals of the Champions League tonight for the first time ever. But why stop there?
As far as challenges go, this may not actually seem like such a historic one for Manchester City tonight. I mean, honestly, 3-1 up from their first leg (away) game does give them a slight advantage. Pile on top of Dynamo Kiev’s misery with the fact they haven’t managed an away win against an English side in Europe in club history (some 13 encounters) and, though I’m not a betting man, I can’t imagine even Manuel Pellegrini messing this one up.
That said, this is a momentous occasion. With victory tonight, Manchester City move into the quarter finals of the Champions League for the first time ever. Remember when they got relegated to the third division? Well they are about to be among the top 8 teams in the game today. If you happened to go into a coma a decade ago and awaken today, this kind of dystopian future were Manchester City are a global, dominating franchise punching above that other team that claims to be from Manchester may be too much for you to handle.
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For us fans, it’s easy to lose sight of the importance of such an accomplishment. Silverware is where it’s at. We winced at Pellegrini’s ill-informed decision to sacrifice the FA Cup in favour of advancement in the Champions League, when the former was imminently more winnable than the latter. But behind the scenes, it’s actually the latter that is the bigger barometer of Manchester City’s success, their development and their future.
All that said, it’s been the talk of the town that a historic quarter finals Champions League finish would be a good end for City. Never been done before, so hey, good start with Pep Guardiola coming in to finish the job at some undetermined time within the next three years, right? Well, perhaps. But why not do it now?
Seems the point is idea on many, but Raheem Sterling, proving he has as much in his head as on it, seems confident that City can go the distance and indeed should. As reported by the Daily Star:
"“With the players we’ve got in this team, we should be trying to go all the way, because we have ability and if we can all pull together, I can see us going as far as we want to,” said Sterling.“We’ve got two good players for every position who can challenge and give the manager a headache for every game.“We should be looking to push on in the Champions League and not just aim for the quarter final but look further beyond that, and hopefully the final. That’s the reason why I came here… be a part of a team that’s pushing for big tournaments like this.”"
To quote Curt Schilling, why not us? Well there’s probably a few good reasons why, I can think of 7 others even. Like, say, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid or Juventus. Heck even the lesser sides present a genuine threat, perhaps one too much for the current Sky Blues side to handle. That’s the thing about coming so far in the competition, suddenly there’s less Borussia Monchengladbachs and more Wolfsburgs.
Even so, I think Sterling’s right in terms of where we should be aiming. A win tonight should only spur on Manchester City to try and reach the semi-finals, which would be a real and, frankly amazing, accomplishment for the year. Who knows what happens after that?
Yes, the current squad has many holes, but those seem to be filling themselves one way or another. The return of Vincent Kompany has single handedly transformed the back line from a group of bumbling, hapless ne’er-do-wells into a nigh impenetrable juggernaut. City have instead struggled in creating at the other end, but with Yaya Toure confirmed back in the lineup tonight and Kevin De Bruyne, Samir Nasri and Fabian Delph all in training for a return, that should help with that also. Oh and Sergio Aguero has scored 16 goals in 17 Champions League starts, so there’s that.
Next: Manchester City - Time to focus on the top 4
Regardless, Manchester City are set to make club history tonight. Either they make it further than ever before in the Champions League, or they have possibly the most epic choke ever and concede 3 goals at home to lose. Assuming for a second it’s the former, why stop there? We’re making history over here, may as well have some fun with it.