EPL TALK: Manchester City’s fourth title in row deserves praise, even if the outcome feels cold

AS expected, Manchester city reverted to their natural state of being. A washing machine for all seasons, capable of cleaning up new trophies and cleaning out old reputations. There are no limits to the spin. Just rinse and repeat; in 2012, 2014, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022, 2023 and now 2024. And return again in 2025. Expect a fresh load, but the same outcome.

A washing machine is measured by the absence of drama. Elite sport is measured by the opposite. It has to be. It’s an escape from the drudgery, not an unwanted add-on.

Washing machines linger in the memory, only when they break down. And what happens when they don’t? Nothing. They just whirr along in the background, mostly out of sight and nearly always out of mind. Hummable tunes are added to offer the illusion of colour and vitality and the noise may briefly distract, but it does not convince.

Still, we gave it a shot with Manchester City anyway, didn’t we? We hummed some fluff about three-horse races and went full Oliver Twist near the end, bowing and scraping in gratitude for that rare, extra crumb of a final-day finish.

Of course, the Dickensian reality of a colossal wealth divide was then delivered with such blunt force, it felt almost satirical. Please, sir, can we have some more? Don’t be ridiculous! Here’s a goal from Phil Foden after 76 seconds to remind everyone who’s really in charge. Quell those foolish notions of equality. The football industrialists of a digital age, ironically powered by old oil money and an army of procrastinating lawyers, reinforced the status quo. This is Manchester City’s world and everyone else is living in it. On meagre rations.

And this is not the fault of Manchester City supporters, any more than it’s Pep Guardiola’s fault for being the best manager in the world, armed with the best bank account in the world to go out and buy the best substitutes’ bench in the world. That’s why he wins these things. Relentless strength feeds the sense of relentless inevitability. While West Ham United dutifully rolled over at the Etihad, Lucas Paquetá had a stab at auditioning for a bit-part on City’s bench. The audition didn’t go particularly well, but that’s besides the point. City turn the best elsewhere into also-rans at the Eithad – Jack Grealish spent less time on the turf than the pitch invaders – because the machine never stops. Flawless efficiency requires the latest spare parts, no matter how small or insignificant to the overriding process.

And what is that process? It’s a 23-match unbeaten run in the league. It’s 91 points without breaking sweat. It’s winning six titles under Guardiola without ever dipping below 89 points a season. It’s being five days away from a double Double, a feat never achieved in the history of English football, after winning a fourth consecutive title, a feat never previously achieved in the history of top-flight football and generating little more than a rueful shrug from the game’s indifferent masses. The possibility of making unrepeatable history twice in a week? Yeah, that’s about right. Who’s up for more of the same next season?

Elite sports franchises have always sought to remove risk from their expensive assets. The jeopardy-free element so popular in American sports appeals to investors who expect absolutes in a football investment that should be anything but. It should also be fun.

Other teams brought the fun, but not the end result

Liverpool brought the fun, and the melancholy, with their academy kids overachieving in the New Year, before succumbing to inexperience, leading a weary Jurgen Klopp to accept that he can no longer rage against those whirring machines.

Tottenham Hotspur also brought the fun, often confusing themselves for Barcelona in the early 2010s, rather than Spurs in the early stages of denial, playing out from the back like tongue-flapping toddlers on a school sports day. The style wasn’t sustainable, obviously, but it didn’t trigger too many complaints from the faithful (who were utterly devoted to Ange-Ball, until it came to the prospect of Arsenal winning the title.)

And the Gunners brought glorious fun to the proceedings, keeping up the pretence of an equal playing field until the final day, nurturing the next England captain in Declan Rice and developing the most reliable defender in the competition in William Saliba. They played the great pretenders, a thankless, dispiriting role that wears out the best of them in the end. Mikel Arteta must already be looking at the diminished reserves of Klopp and thinking, ‘there but for the grace of God’ and so forth.

Even Aston Villa and Chelsea and Luton Town, in their own endearing way, brought a sense of frenzied, madcap fun to a season where the title winner was rarely in doubt. And that’s a problem for everyone not associated with Manchester City. The stadium turnstile and the EPL streaming subscription provide refuge from the mundane, not an extension of it.

In Singapore, a remarkable 5,000-odd fans turned up at the Marina Bay Sands ballroom looking for one, watching all 10 games simultaneously in the hope of a system malfunction, a spanner in the industrial works, an act of rebellion against the immovable objects, anything vaguely anarchic, free-spirited, and different. And they found their fun, in Rasmus Højlund’s impressive finishing for Manchester United, in Chelsea’s stellar end to the campaign, in Tottenham’s top-five spot, in Klopp’s send-off and even in Mohammed Kudus’ ridiculously brilliant overhead kick.

That’s what fans do. They are incurable optimists. They look for the light, a reason to believe next season. And they always find it. In return, they just ask for a little drama. Something human. Something messy and flawed and unexpected. Something that doesn’t feel like the early draft of a James Cameron script.

We’ve already seen the Manchester City movie. We’ve seen it four years in a row under Guardiola’s direction and the production values remain unrivalled. The artistry is matched only by the ambition as the machine continues to evolve. To advance. To win. It’s impressive, but overly familiar. And the spectacle is perhaps less interesting to watch if we already know the ending.

Neil Humphreys is an award-winning football writer and a best-selling author, who has covered the English Premier League since 2000 and has written 28 books.

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