Getty Image / Daniela Porcelli
It has been a much longer road than many expected it to be.
For most of the last decade, Manchester City has been seen as one of the best teams in world football and have regularly expected to be one of the favorites to win the Champions League.
Despite putting together a loaded squad and spending tons of money year after year, that Champions League trophy has eluded them.
In fact, it took them until two years ago to finally make it to the final of the competition.
They fell short against Chelsea in that final. Last season, they made it back to the semi-final, but ran into a team that has had no trouble bringing home Champions League trophies. Real Madrid eliminated them in extra time.
This season, Man City finally got over the hump. Throughout this season, Manchester City ran through the competition in the Champions League.
They won their group by 5 points. Then they annihilated RB Leipzig, beating them 8-1 on aggregate.
Things didn’t get any more difficult in the quarterfinals as they beat German champions Bayern Munich 4-1 on aggregate.
Then they got their revenge against Real with a 5-1 aggregate win in the semis.
Today, they were finally challenged by Inter Milan.
It took them until the 68th minute to find a breakthrough against Inter and they had to survive some dicey moments, but City finally won a Champions League trophy by a score of 1-0.
Man City have done it! 🏆 #UCLfinal pic.twitter.com/kU6ok68vgP
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) June 10, 2023
Now that Manchester City has finally gotten over the hump, the rest of Europe should be worried.
For years now, the only real argument for why Man City shouldn’t be the favorite to win this competition was because they had repeatedly failed up to live up to expectations. Now that they’ve finally gotten the win, they may make a habit of it.
It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve seen it. Georgia struggled for years to finally get by Alabama again. They had fallen short in SEC title games and in national title games. Last year, they finally got by the Tide. This year they repeated as champions.
Talent has never been an issue for Manchester City. In fact, they have more than they know what to do with as they regularly have stars end up stuck on their bench.
They have one of the sport’s best coaches and have plenty of funding to continue to put together one of the most talented squads in the world.
With the pressure of finally getting that first Champions League trophy off of Manchester City, the rest of Europe may need to worry about how many more they can win in the near future.