There is never a bad time to win the competition, clearly, but this year would hardly be the fulfilment of the club's well-publicised 'project'
The best team in Europe? Manchester City aren’t even the best team in England.
Or the second. Or, as it stands, the third for that matter.
This City squad is actually the club’s worst since Wayne Bridge, Shaun Wright-Phillips and other expensively-assembled, average footballers led them to fifth in the Premier League six years ago.
Sergio Aguero and Kevin De Bruyne aside, the current lot are comprised mostly of once-excellent players whose best days are behind them and those who are simply not good enough.
And while the summer clear-outs that are mooted so feverishly in gossip columns rarely take place, it will be interesting to see exactly how many of them have a future under Pep Guardiola.
Aleksandar Kolarov, Fernando and Wilfried Bony are just three names who will presumably not be extending the rental agreements on their Cheshire mansions any time soon.
They won’t be the only ones, either, with more established individuals also in danger of being bombed out.
Yet here City are – one game away from the Champions League final.
If they are to progress to next month’s final in Milan, though, Manuel Pellegrini’s side must achieve something never previously done.
That is produce a notable, watershed performance in UEFA’s elite club competition.
The Citizens are deserving of their last-four position, of course, but there have been few thrills in their European campaign so far.
Sure, the late rally at home to Borussia Monchengladbach was impressive, while the win at Dynamo Kiev was efficient enough. Ditto the draw in Paris.
Thrilling, though? Not really.
Even last week’s visit of Real Madrid – presumably the sort of glamour tie the club’s owners dreamt of when ploughing nearly £1bn into the club since 2008 – came and went without any sense of occasion.
That is not especially surprising considering the Etihad is rarely full for Champions League fixtures and the supporters who do turn up routinely boo the tournament’s iconic anthem.
Even though their reasons for doing so are sound – albeit a little petty – it only adds to the sense of pointlessness that lingers around City in Europe.
At least when Chelsea lifted the big-eared cup four years ago – having, like City this time around, endured a disappointing domestic campaign – they did so with substance, if not always style.
The comeback at home to Napoli, the against-all-odds display at the Camp Nou and, of course, the penalty shoot-out win against Bayern Munich.
Those were all significant moments which added to not just the competition’s legacy, but also the club’s.
At City, though, there is a vacancy.
And the only way for the tournament to resonate is by creating experiences that make it to do so.
For reasons already stated, the likelihood of this particular side overcoming Real Madrid and Bayern Munich and/or Atletico is improbable.
That’s OK, though.
There is never a bad time to win the Champions League, obviously.
But doing so this year with an outgoing manager, a squad that is to shortly endure significant turnover and ambivalent supporters would hardly be the fulfilment of the club’s well-publicised ‘project’.
A performance of meaning at the Bernabeu would, however, at least give City a past in this competition.
That, in turn, will help to shape the club’s future.
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