The smugness is rising to the surface again. Manchester United fans, having had manners put on them after all these years with that 6-1 shellacking in October and City’s prolonged spell at the summit of the Premiership table, are beginning to return to something more like their old selves. The fans, that is, not the team, who at no point this season have come close to resembling the stylish, swashbuckling crew that conquered Europe in 1999 and 2008. Nonetheless, the table never lies, and there they stand, top of the pile.

Obviously it is hardly a coincidence that United’s return to the top has coincided with the first sustained slump City have endured this season, and United’s vast army of fans — who, thanks to their all-powerful marketing machine, still outnumber us by a ratio of at least 50:1 — haven’t been shy letting me know about it, as is their wont. Any thoughts I may have entertained of a majestic, imperious, stress-free procession to the title have had to be shelved: this will need to be done the hard way.
City’s exit from the Europa League, while confirming that a significant degree of stagnation has set in, was not without a silver lining, United having also crashed out in Bilbao two hours earlier (thus freeing them to concentrate entirely on the title race). The spectre of City having to juggle domestic demands with Thursday-night assignments in various far-flung European locations certainly would have pleased Alex Ferguson no end, and you can be sure the red-nosed one cursed inwardly when he saw City had bit the Europa dust too. All that remains now for both sides is a ten-game run-in which in all probability will boil down to the late-April derby at Eastlands, an encounter so monumentally huge that the pulse races just thinking about it.
The two Mancunian giants’ relatively tame exit from European combat, added to Arsenal’s feeble capitulation in Milan a few weeks ago, has strengthened the suspicion that English football’s day in the sun has come to an end, with only Chelsea keeping the side up courtesy of a fine escape act against Napoli in what was arguably the best match we’ve seen all season. Freed of the shackles imposed by Andre Villas-Boas’ excessively long-sighted insistence on marginalising the Mourinho-era old guard, the likes of Terry, Lampard and Drogba turned in a vintage display, which may (though it’s impossible to foresee Roman Abramovich’s whims with any great accuracy) have propelled Roberto Di Matteo into a position where the manager’s gig becomes his by popular demand. He is certainly no less qualified than his unlamented predecessor was, having brought West Bromwich Albion up in fine style a few years ago and been treated atrociously by their board when the going inevitably got a little tough in the top flight. Indeed, if the west Londoners negotiate the challenge posed by Benfica in the imminent Champions League quarter-final, a season widely dismissed as a write-off just a few weeks ago might suddenly start to hold out the promise of riches untold.
With eight teams still standing, the Champions League now reaches the point where every match qualifies as unmissable. The competition, obviously, has much about it that is less than appealing: indeed, if you flick over to page 78 of this fine organ, you may notice that my colleague Eamonn McCann has unleashed a withering polemic against the tournament’s competitive structure and the motives behind its creation. It certainly cannot be denied that the relentless rich-get-richer trend of the last two decades has done much to make the European football landscape a less attractive one, unless you’re one of those souls who actively enjoy watching the giant superclubs lord it over their inferiors in a manner reminiscent of Orwell’s boot stamping on the human face for all eternity.
The phenomenon is mirrored across almost every national league in Europe: the Premiership was a lot more appetising when the likes of Norwich City (1993) could reasonably aspire to mount a sustained season-long title challenge, rather than knowing in advance that a top-half finish was the absolute apex of their aspirations. The Spanish league, beautifully balanced as recently as ten years ago, has disintegrated to the point where Real and Barca are routinely 20-30 points clear of the pursuing pack long before season’s end. It is surely impossible for anyone other than the superclubs’ Financial Controllers to see this as desirable (though recent events at Glasgow Rangers suggest that rampant greed can still backfire, and football’s richest clubs may yet have to face a bonfire of the vanities if they expect to live it up endlessly on credit).
But club football has always, always, been governed to some extent by money (which is another very good reason to cherish the international version as far more authentic and real). This doesn’t negate the fact that, at its highest level, the Champions League can still serve up absolutely spellbinding drama. Those who protest at a lack of romance certainly have a point, but the presence of APOEL Nicosia in this season’s last eight serves to demonstrate that the odds can still be defied. Benfica and Marseilles may not exactly be Longford Town, but neither would come within an ass’s roar of any list of the European financial elite: both are still standing with three fences left to clear. As for Chelsea, Barca, Real, Bayern, AC Milan – well, nobody in their right mind would dispute their financial clout, but when you watch any of these clubs strut their stuff on their better days, you realise that it’s a privilege to watch great footballers marshalled together into great teams. Any genuinely serious football fan inclined to look the other way when Milan and Barca go head to head next week needs his or her head examined: likewise, APOEL’s attempt to storm the Bernabeu and turf Real Madrid out, in what would almost certainly go down as European football’s all-time shock result.
Jose Mourinho being the sort of character he is, it is of course infinitely more likely that Real will mercilessly rip APOEL to shreds, while Benfica and Marseille almost certainly don’t have the ammunition to go all the way. Milan look a little too old, and one excellent night’s football doesn’t seriously do enough to suddenly suggest that a Chelsea side who have huffed and puffed all season long have enough about them to win the whole thing. Realistically, on all known form, this leaves the trio of Real Madrid, Bayern Munich and Barcelona as the heavyweight contenders. Bayern’s recent 7-0 evisceration of Basle did not exactly belie the stereotype of German ruthlessness and mercilessness, and if they were to get to the Final (which, of course, is in Munich), I would be far from shocked to see Bayern knock Barcelona off their stride.
Before then, however, they would need to get past Real Madrid, who at 2/1 against are the team to back, standing a full ten points clear of Barca in the Spanish league, which surely calls into question whether it is any longer legitimate to hail the Catalan conjurors as ‘The Greatest Team Of All Time’. They were indeed exactly that at their peak (last year) but evidence is beginning to mount that the moment may have passed. By their own elevated standards, Barca have stuttered significantly this season, at least away from the Nou Camp, winning less than half of their away games to date. By contrast Real, week after week, have beaten everything that’s been put in front of them, scoring at a blood-curdling rate (88 goals in 26 games). The only question mark relates to whether they can actually beat Barca in one-off matches (Mourinho’s record against them since his arrival is remarkably poor) but there’s no reason at all to suspect that the task is beyond them.
Remarkably, Europe’s premier club competition has yet to serve up a Real-Barca final, a prospect which looks extremely likely this year and would be so mouth-watering on so many levels that it seems positively perverse not to hope it comes to pass. Here’s hoping. And failing that, it might be nice if APOEL went all the way.