Blue Moon rang around the Etihad on Sunday evening after Manchester City won an unprecedented fourth consecutive Premier League title.
In a riveting title race between Pep Guardiola’s men and Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal that went down to the final day, it was Manchester City that came out on top as the men in blue made it six titles in seven years.
Erling Haaland described it as “incredible”, the player of the season Phil Foden hailed the feat as “special”, Jack Grealish proclaimed the achievement as “unbelievable” and club captain Kyle Walker called the club’s fourth title on the bounce as “as dream come true”.
City 3-1 West Ham
How Manchester City did it
Two league points separated City and Arsenal before yesterday’s final round of fixtures and that margin remained unchanged at the final whistle with both teams picking up wins.
It took just 74 seconds for Manchester City to go ahead in their match against West Ham United – which was their last with David Moyes in charge – when Foden’s stunner found the top corner.
It is a lot of work, a lot of respect and being humble
Pep Guardiola
The 23-year-old, who now has six Premier League titles to his name, doubled his side’s lead with Rodri restoring a two-goal advantage after the deficit was halved by a stupendous acrobatic goal by Irons attacking midfielder Mohammed Kudus.
Their 3-1 win was enough to secure them the title no matter what happened at Emirates Stadium between Arsenal and Everton.
The club do, however, remain under investigation over historic rules violations and have an unprecedented 115 charges lodged against them. A hearing is expected later this year.
But was so nearly an embarrassing end to a splendid season for Arteta’s men when a deflection off Declan Rice’s head saw Idrissa Gueye’s free-kick find the back of the net and put the Toffees ahead.
Arsenal 2-1 Everton
Exhilarating
But goals from Takehiro Tomiyasu and Kai Havertz secured the 2-1 win for Arteta’s men and ensured they finished the season on 89 points, two off City but a tally that is bettered only by their Invincibles season of 2003-04 (90). The Gunners also picked up their most wins in a season, most goals, best goal difference and most clean sheets in a campaign that has left them so close to a first title in two decades.
“It was nice,” Guardiola, who is behind only Sir Alex Ferguson in terms of Premier League trophies won, said. “It has been an incredible season. Arsenal sent us a message to be careful for future years. If someone said I’d have won six [titles] in seven I’d have said you were insane.
“Now is our period. I don’t know [what the secret is]. I have incredible support. We’ve contaminated everyone with work ethic.
“It is a lot of work, a lot of respect and being humble.”
A defiant Arteta said: “I’m very proud. It feels good because success can not only be measured by comparing to somebody else, we need to understand what we are doing. We’ve beat every record this club ever had apart from winning it. This is the most competitive league ever.
“Now we have to be more determined, very courageous, very ambitious, and we need to go to a different level. We need to deliver.”
And as the curtain closes on an exhilarating season of Premier League football, put 17 August in the diary because there are only 90 days until we do it all over again.