10 Years on and it's still 6-1

23rd October 2011. 

Every City fan will have their own memories of that day whether they were at Old Trafford or not. I've written about the day itself, and the time before it happened. I don't need to go on about it but this was only the 2nd time City had won there since 1974. 

It's a day which gets sung about every game City have played in since. In the days after the match it felt big, but a decade on I think we're still feeling the tremors of it now. It was debated whether the "balance of power" (whatever that means) was going to shift. Safe to say "this is how it feels to be City" has changed over the last decade.

In the short term, the game put City 5 points clear in the league during the 2011/12 season and added a lot of confidence to a team that had only dropped points once already that season. The moment on the pitch and the jubilation off it were memorable for me over the next few weeks, we played Wolves twice in a week scoring 8 goals just after the 6-1, we then won away at Villarreal 3-0 in the Champions League before a back and forth 3-2 win away at QPR before there was an international break. I was lucky enough to be at all of those games and for City fans it was unchartered territory. We were flying. The momentum did run out after awhile. Points dropped around Christmas and New Year, followed by some pretty average performances as Winter turned to Spring felt like City had run out of steam.

Anyone reading this knows what happened. A generation of younger football fans, or supporters of other clubs may just think the 2011/12 season was a case of thumbs being twiddled until Aguero scored the winner in May, but it wasn't. Balotelli sent off at Arsenal, Arterta scoring from long range - 8 points behind with 6 games to go. The madness at Carrow Road where Tevez was back to his best, the unforgettable moment in Wolverhampton pre game when Steven Pienaar told us that "God Is Great", Yaya Toure stepping up and being the match winner at St James Park in an unbelievably tense game. 

But when Aguero did score that goal, it came back to the 6-1. That shift in goal difference was effectively the game that won it for City seven months later. We won the league by 8 goals. Every goal counted from August onwards, but in the 90th minute when De Gea and Rio caused a right fuck up and the ball goes out for a City corner the next 4 minutes or so are vital in what happened in May and really, what's happened since.

The following year they came back stronger and we fell apart. Mancini didn't say 'good morning' to Les Chapman, Van Persie went to United and we thought that Maicon would fit into XL shorts. But apart from that, well, it's all been pretty exceptional from the boys in blue whilst them from outside the city boundaries have gone in a constant cycle of being "back" before quickly rushing round their mums box room to find that old Norwich scarf.

Since the 6-1 we have won the league five times in 10 years. Perhaps we've underperformed in the FA Cup, but United have only won it once in that time too. We all know we've underperformed in the Champions League albeit we've been in it every year since the 6-1, only under Pellegrini's last season have we even threatened to not come in the top four, having said that, in the 2015-16 season if we'd won our last two games of the season instead of drawing them we would have come 2nd. Them lot on the other hand have years where they haven't qualified for the Champions League, yes they won the Europa League in 2017 but only a handful of years earlier "Thursday night, Channel 5" was a chant often heard from United fans mocking the trophy. And as for the biggest trophy of the lot, well we've won the league cup six times since 23rd October 2011, one for every goal that we scored at Old Trafford that day. Really makes me sad to think that as I left the ground that day, almost dizzy from what I saw, that I didn't know what 'Carabao' meant.

Time to sound really bitter? Yeah, why not. It's absolutely fucking fantastic that this happened to United when Ferguson was the manager. The BBC have done an article about the game which featured his post match interview, "dominated the first 30 minutes" - did they fuck, the old piss can. You shouldn't laugh at a pensioner looking suicidal, but then again Kevin Reynolds had it right when he kicked him in the bollocks at Euston. All the other chancers that have come and gone since like Moyes or that current plank would have just caused a bit of a shrug of the shoulder from the fans. It's important for us City fans to never let the 6-1 go because as the years go by there's more and more vomit inducing content glamorising United's time in the 90's (don't bother watching Fever Pitch or whatever it was called), and you still can't move without the OG Rat Boy Neville being plastered on TV at every fucking opportunity. The new generation of eReds who've never been within 100 miles of Manchester think they won every game every fucking week for 25 years, well riddle me this - how come they didn't get 100 points in a season?

The amount of colleagues, friends of friends, even customers through work I've spoken to over the years who (debatably - there's no way of proving it, is there?) used to go to watch United a lot, they all seem to have packed it in around 2013-14. They still hark back to the days when that horrible prick was there, sounding more and more like Arsenal fans going on about replacing Vieira in midfield. 

It wasn't a game where we won a trophy. You cannot win a league in October. But as far as a game that set the tone in the relationship between two clubs for the next decade goes, and a game where it showed where City were going as a club it was as important as anything. Something like it just cannot ever happen again. "You lucky bastards, it should have been 10!" - We're the luckiest of bastards, and long may it continue.

I'm Outta Time

How do you even begin to write about Sergio Aguero at Manchester City?

We're on the eve of the last opportunity City's famous striker could play for us in the Premier League, all being well he is fit enough to start and lead the team out in front of a crowd, but at the very least even if he cannot walk properly I'd imagine he'd still come on for the last few minutes.

There's only a few signings that I can remember exactly where I was when the news came through. For some reason I cannot place where I was when Bony was confirmed and I wasn't pressing F5 when it looked like we had sealed Sylvinho's signature. But I remember Sergio. Whilst others opted for signing of the summer Charlie Adam, or as the song goes, Phil Jones, City signed Kun Aguero.

There's few debuts I can recall moment for moment. It helps I suppose when you're making your debut as a substitute, but I can still remember the excitement and expectation as this young Argentinian was warming up in the second half. I can still hear my mate Green saying to me, "can you imagine if he comes on and scores a cracker? It'll be a better buzz than Robinho's debut." And it probably was a better buzz and you'd probably say his City career was a bit better than Robinho's, I think.

I've often thought about that night since the news was released that he would be leaving us at the end of the season and it made me think about what Sergio has done at City. As his time comes to an end at City a lot of the noise outside of the fanbase will of course be around that day in May 2012, and as much as it should be, for City fans we had 10 years of his magic. At City Sergio redefined what it meant to make an instant impact on your debut. He redefined goal scoring consistency. He redefined match winning moments. He redefined league winning moments. Overall he redefined Manchester City F.C.

To talk about Sergio only in terms of what happened in May 2012 is to me if I have a conversation with someone about Oasis. People from the outside only want to talk about Definitely Maybe or Morning Glory, much like the game against QPR, but I loved it all. His performances in the 2013/14 season were my Be Here Now, Aguero scoring hat tricks on consecutive weekends vs Arsenal and Chelsea in 2018/19 is my Dig Out Your Soul. Unfortunately this season has been very much like the power cut at the Heaton Park gig in 2009, but he's got enough credit in the bank to allow that to happen.

In the early days he scored in the 6-1. He scored what felt like an important winner in his first season against Villarreal. He scored the winner away at Arsenal in the League Cup when we hadn't won at Arsenal for about 40 years. He scored the winner away in Porto (that would be nice to see again, wouldn't it?) He scored 6 goals in the final 6 games of the 2011/12 season - lest we forget that we won the league that season by 8 goals. The following year wasn't great for City, but he still scored in an FA Cup semi final and one of my all time favourite moments scoring the winner at Old Trafford in April 2013.

In the 13/14 season, he was injured for large parts of it and for most fans the two stand out performers were Yaya and Dzeko but in all competitions Aguero scored 28 in 34 games. When you consider that he's not known for hitting the ground running when he gets back from an injury that is quite remarkable. The goal he scored at home to United to put us one up is a favourite of mine from that season, a great finish on a great day - although I'm still annoyed that we didn't put 7 or 8 past them being 4-0 up after 50 minutes. 

There were times where the rest of the team was on the whole underperforming but he got us over the line or kept us in the fight. The 2014/15 season isn't one that particularly stirs up any great memories as we didn't win anything, in fact it was the only season since the 2008-09 season where we didn't get to a semi final of a cup competition. The team was a bit disjointed, Yaya and Silva looked tired from 5 years of playing every single week, Mangala was a flop, Jovetic and Lampard were playing a lot of games, Pellegrini was looking out of his depth but Aguero's goals got us to 2nd place in the league and one of the stand out nights of that year was his hat trick at home to Bayern Munich. Surprisingly that was his only season as the golden boot winner.

Again, the following season for the club wasn't particularly remarkable despite winning the League Cup and getting to the Champions League semi final (how far we've come eh?) but again Aguero's numbers in the league were brilliant - 24 goals in 30 appearances. It's not the most significant moment by any stretch, but one of my favourite moments from Aguero was a goal that only he could score at home vs Chelsea in front of the newly expanded South Stand. In the reverse fixture me and my mates had a great day out at Stamford Bridge where Sergio scored all three goals as we won 3-0, one of the highlights of the season.

All change at the start of the 2016/17 season, new badge, new manager and all things MCFC and been changed to "Man City" - that last bit still irks me, as we're not from "Man". Sergio scored the first goal under Pep and although he started the season well, things weren't always rosy between Aguero and Guardiola - the arrival of Gabriel Jesus seemed to unsettle Sergio somewhat, but over time that seemed to be less of an issue. There's so many great Sergio memories over the years that this season doesn't particularly stand out yet he scored 33 times in 45 appearances!

2017/2018 was a significant season for the club and for Sergio. The team broke all sorts of records as we won our 3rd Premier League title, some of which we may never see broken again whether it be the 100 points, 106 goals, 18 consecutive league wins, 32 league wins, just to name a few. Another record I don't think we're likely to see broken was when Sergio scored away at Napoli to become the clubs all time leading goal scorer. Unfortunately I wasn't there to witness it but all the same it was an incredible achievement that Sergio broke Eric Brook's record that had been there for decades. Loads of great highlights from Sergio that season, the opening goal in the Carabao Cup final vs Arsenal, the four goals at home to Leicester, giving it out to that copper who held that City fan down on the pitch away to Bournemouth. Despite personal and club landmarks that season it still feels like a bit of a "what if" season for Aguero as again injuries hampered him - 21 goals in 25 league appearances is again ridiculous numbers, makes you wonder what he could have done if he was fit all season.

After a lay off and surgery Sergio seemed to be back to his best. Winning the Community Shield he scored both the goals, the first of which was his 200th goal for City. In the first home game of the season he scored a hat trick against Huddersfield. Another goal in a derby at home to United in November in typical Sergio way - blasting the ball as hard at the near post as possible. After some poor form around Christmas, City needed to beat Liverpool at home in January 2019 to get themselves back in to the title race. Any other result would have seen City struggling to catch Liverpool. Similar to the goal against United 2 months earlier, a trademark Aguero goal got us 1-0 up going in to half time - the pace of the game and the power in Sergio's shot is unbelievable - it was so intense at the time living in that title race but reflecting on it, you were looking at two of the great modern era teams going at it and of course Sergio scored. The aforementioned hat tricks on consecutive weekends to Arsenal and Chelsea played a huge part in City building our momentum for retaining the title, the Chelsea hat trick in particular was stunning. As things got more and more tense as the season went on, Aguero as always with ice in his veins provided some important and crucial goals - Fulham away and especially Burnley away stand out in my mind as games where I felt like I was about to have a heart attack in the away end due to the pressure of the situation. And then who else can you rely on when it's the final game of the season? City went 1-0 down to Brighton in the first half at the Amex, for me the enormity of that didn't even have time to sink in because before you knew it, Aguero had scored an equaliser and we went on to win 4-1 and retain the league title.

After winning 5 of the previous 6 domestic trophies, the 2019/20 season always had the potential to feel a bit flat. And it did. However, Aguero still broke records and scored important goals, because that's what he does. I was there at Villa Park in January 2020 as he overtook Thierry Henry as the highest scoring international player in English history. Just read that again. Anyone who saw Henry in his pomp understands that he was one of the greatest foreign players to ever kick a ball in England and Sergio has gone past his record. And he also broke Alan Shearer's hat trick record. I grew up on Alan Shearer, he was probably my non-City hero when I was a kid and again Aguero has broken his record. The following month and again against Aston Villa he scored the opening goal as City went on to win the Carabao Cup for the 3rd time in a row.

I went to Sheffield Wednesday in the FA Cup. Bit of an unremarkable night, albeit I can recall having a laugh in the car with my mates as we went over The Pennines. We won 1-0, Aguero scored. Got back in the car and listened to the draw for the next round - Newcastle away, buzzing, night out in Newcastle on the cards. And then the world stopped. I was fortunate enough to attend the 2021 Carabao Cup final, but for 13 months the last City goal I had seen scored was by Aguero. I'm sure there's people out there who went to Sheffield that night who didn't go to Wembley nor have got tickets for Everton this weekend.

Soon after "Project Restart" Aguero got a bad injury. I don't really want to reflect too much on this season because it's not how I'll remember Aguero, struggling for fitness and form, looking numb on the bench as the team look to have found a winning formula without him. The goal at Palace was a nice reminder though of what he is all about, and I'm pleased that the last points we picked up before we won this years title had his influence on it. It's a shame that things are having to end, but all good things do unfortunately.

There's so many records and moments I've listed here. And there's always more. He's scored in every home league game against Liverpool. He's City's highest scorer in Manchester derbies. He has the highest goal scoring ratio in Premier League history. It goes on and on. But like Zabaleta, Yaya Toure, Kompany and David Silva before him it's what he meant to supporters more than just stats. Aguero will always be linked with that moment in May 2012, a moment that transcends football in all honesty, there will be people in this country who have no idea about football but they know about the dramatic moment where he scored the late winner to secure City's first league title in 44 years. 

I'm no fan of Martin Tyler, but his commentary over that moment is iconic. I've watched the highlights of that game so many times that for me the best part of his commentary that day gets overlooked. Just after the final whistle he says, "but the bare facts will never tell you the whole story" - words that reflect the run in of the 2011/12 season, and words that reflect Sergio Aguero and his time at City. 

I really hope that either against Everton or next week in Porto we see the great man one more time, he still has some magic left in him and potentially one last great moment, and if that is to win the Champions League then it will be a fitting end for one of the greatest players not just City but English football has ever seen. 

And of course I don't want my last memory of him in a City shirt to be that fucking penalty.

Nothing Ever Lasts Forever

Well, it looks like the end is in sight.

Just as Britain looks like it's going to wake up from it's lockdown slumber, the era of hoovering up trophies which has been Manchester City for the past 24 months seems to be at an end (for now). Obviously the league has been on the cards for some time, as I write this we're hours away from our first league game as former champions against the new champions Liverpool. No denying they've completely deserved it, regardless of City not being at the races this year they've been almost unstoppable and I'm sure will go down as one of the greatest single seasons in English football. But I'm not here to talk about them.

What's happened over this last few months has been mental hasn't it? I don't want to make light of anything because it's extremely sad so many lives have been lost, the pressures put on to key workers has been immense and the reality is that many will lose jobs after the furlough scheme ends. However, I have to say that I've had a very fortunate lockdown. Around a week into the UK coming to a standstill I moved over to my parents place in Southport where I've been incredibly well looked after, I've had the opportunity to exercise most days and I've even started to learn Spanish, all whilst 75% of the time the weather has been pleasant and from my parents balcony I've been looking out across the Irish Sea. Also, not consuming 12 pints of Guinness and eating a kebab every weekend has probably been a good thing and the lack of City/commute to work has actually got me to a position where I'm not having an anxiety attack by the 5th of the month wondering how the fuck am I going to get to payday again with what's coming out and what I have left in my bank account. 

A bit of perspective really. I've also tried to put a bit of distance between myself and social media. Over the past decade I've used Twitter more than anything else, mostly for keeping up to date with what's going on in football. But as football ended on the 13th March, I was looking through my timeline and realising that I really couldn't give a fuck about what a lot of people have to say. Then there's people out there that I like and have an interest in things they say, but it doesn't mean that any of these people are my friends. And I think lockdown has really shown who is your mate and who isn't your mate. This morning for example I got a message off a guy a went to uni with, probably seen him 5 times in the past decade but this is the 3rd time he's reached out to me since this all began. Whereas there's people I see/read every Saturday for years but it's probably not crossed either of our minds to be in touch. It is what it is I guess. And as for Facebook, fuck me I don't know why I still have it. It's either some woman I met on a night out in 2008 putting pictures of her kids up or a bloke I went to school with who is unashamedly expressing an outrageous racist opinion with the tagline of "dont like it then fuck off!" or something equally as thought provoking. 

Ironically the void I've tried to fill in distracting myself with social media has been taken up by Bluemoon. So now instead of scrolling through a timeline, I'm just reading thread after thread of shit opinions and unashamedly racist bollocks from "Barry Conlon's Deep Fat Fryer" instead of @IconicIlkay. Do yourselves a favour and never enter the Political Forum, it's not worth your blood pressure. 

Which vaguely brings me on to City. The last blog I posted I got quite a bit of enjoyment writing about all things which have been shit about the past decade, and I think I'll probably enjoy writing about things that are shit at the moment. But things aren't really that shit at the moment.

Well not being there is shit. Football behind closed doors is shit. I don't usually watch a lot of football outside of watching City live and I've somehow watched Sheffield United 4 times in the past 2 weeks. As a former resident of London Road, Sheffield a stones throw away from Bramall Lane I've had a bit of a soft spot fort'Blades. And the Greasy Chip Butty song rivals the Ludo Miklosko song (sorry if that's now in your head). But fucking hell they're bad to watch. And Villa. And West Ham. And Burnley. And Bournemouth. And Norwich (how the fuck did we lose to them?!). In fact, I sometimes cannot believe how popular football is. As a fan that goes to most the games, Chelsea, Southampton, Brighton and Watford away games are all ones I look forward to, so I'm pretty gutted that I've missed out on them this year. But then again, I've probably lost a stone and I'll probably be out of debt in August, so swings and roundabouts. What has been particularly horrific is the last game I went to was the derby, I've still not seen their 2nd goal mind. 

Yes we've lost the league and it hurts. Like any love story, it hurts when he/she goes out of your life, but then the most exciting bit is the chase for the next one. Those Autumn/Winter months of 2011, 2013 and 2017 were the most exciting times - yeah actually winning the title is the memory that stands out but when I think of QPR away in November 2011, beating Spurs at home in November 2013 or Chelsea away in September 2017 it gets me giddy as it's that point when you start thinking "it's on here". But I suppose the question is, do we have what it takes for next season?

At this point it looks like we're going to have to invest a bit. 3 players key to winning 6 competitions in just over a year (Kompany, Sane, Silva) will not be with us next season. We knew losing Vincent was going to be big but I don't think most were predicting it would be as big as it has been. Add to that Laporte's injury and Stones/Otamendi's inconsistent form and it's clear that defensive reinforcements are a priority. We've got a few games between now and the end of the season which don't mean a great deal, so any time that Eric Garcia and Taylor Harwood-Bellis can get would be preferential as if they flourish then it could save us some money.

It's been positive to see Tommy Doyle and Cole Palmer being involved in the squad, with Palmer apparently really impressing Pep. I've only seen Palmer play once in the flesh and he did stand out, however I'm not sure you can really judge a player too much from playing at under 18's. Just had a flashback to people saying Brandon Barker should be in the team instead of Jesus Navas as I typed that. I'm a big fan of Doyle, I've probably watched him 8-10 times and he's always looked the part. Another name that is getting linked with making the bench/appearances before the end of the season is Jayden Braaf. I'll be honest and say that I've only seen him in the flesh once and I thought he looked bright but not the finished article. A lot of City fans who watch YouTube compilations of players seem to think that he's the next Sancho... all players develop differently and you know I sell things to dickheads for a living, I'm not a scout, but for me he's not near Sancho level. But then I didn't think Sancho was going to be as good as Brahim Diaz and right now I've got that wrong. An exciting young prospect no doubt but I think if he does get his chance I do hope that the fan boys on Twitter don't ruin his confidence if he doesn't have a great first game.

I've spoken about the positives here but the negative is really quite a big negative - and at the moment it's unknown. So much depends on this CAS appeal. In the worst case scenario it isn't the end of the world, but it will take some adjusting to. I've already mentioned 3 players which were key to our recent success who will be gone, and when you think that Fernandinho, Aguero, Otamendi (as much as he can be a liability, he was in the PL team of the year in 2018) and Walker are all at the wrong end of their careers/they will need replacing within the next 2 years, we could probably do with having Champions League football to attract the best and also they will cost a lot of money to replace. Having said that, we signed David Silva and Yaya Toure without Champions League football. The show will go on, and the club won't fall to pieces, but as well as the issue above you would risk losing our players who hold the most value - Sterling, de Bruyne, Laporte, Bernardo. If it gets thrown out/if it's only one year then I think we'll be able to live with that. 

We've got 7 weeks left of football for this season, top 4 spot as good as done, 2 games to win to retain the FA Cup and then 4 games to try and win the Champions League. It probably won't happen but if that's how it turns out then perhaps the big bald Dyson hasn't completely packed in yet, and it will probably go down as one of the greatest seasons the clubs had. Which would probably suit these odd times we're living in.

Six shit things about City in the 2010's

The club, the local press and City bloggers will be typing up their drafts right now as to what an incredible decade the 2010's have been for City.

There's no denying it, 4 leagues, 6 domestic cups and a few bin lids - there's no team in the decades "top 6" that we've not had a game where City have knocked at least 5 past them in a single game. No one else can say that and despite not winning the Champions League it would be very difficult to argue that the 2010's have been City's decade. And that's without even mentioning the "moments" - the FA Cup win to end 35 trophy-less years, the 6-1 at Old Trafford, the Aguero moment, winning three titles from 'impossible' positions, becoming 'Centurions' and the first English men's team to win the domestic treble.

But when you're a cynical bastard who revels in misery and sneers at the happiness of others then it's time someone stepped up and highlighted some of the shit of this decade and I think I'm the man to do so, so here you have it in no particular order here are six shit things about City in the 2010's:

Wigan Athletic
Any of three fixtures against these lot could be seen as a relative low point in the decade. Since we've been successful it's really hard to look beyond the FA Cup final as being the grimmest day watching City. From waking up to the news that City were planning on binning Mancini to get in a manager I'd never heard of, to Ben Watson scoring a last minute winner, to walking outside into rain so heavy you could have thought I'd had 3 buckets of water thrown over my head, it was all shit. The mere thought of it makes me see the dark clouds in the air just before we walked in the stadium singing "you can stick your Pellegrini up your arse" all over again. The cherry on top of a painfully frustrating and disappointing season, Mancini was sacked within 48 hours, 1 year to the day since his most famous victory vs QPR.

9 months later and we're playing them again the FA Cup quarter finals. A completely different feel to this season though as the previous-inserted-into-arse Pellegrini had got us banging the goals in and looking like we couldn't be stopped, domestically anyway. I was due to travel to Barcelona after this game as we had the second leg of our Champions League last 16 fixture that week, just the little issue of the now Championship Wigan to see off. Forgot to mention that they were relegated just after the Cup final victory. We welcomed them with a City cult hero as manager - Uwe Rosler had a banner up in the South/East stand corner and his name reverberated round the ground before the game. I have no real recollection of this game (believe it or not I've avoided watching any highlights) apart from The Engineer, The Charming Man, Manuel Pellegrini decided not to wear a nice suit like he had in every game he'd managed us in so far this season but he wore what looked like pyjamas. If he didn't naturally look like death warmed up anyway I'd presume that he had overslept and didn't have time to get changed before speeding up to Manchester from Mere Golf Club. He looked exactly how City played - a load of shit with our minds elsewhere. We lost 2-1 and lost again a few days later to Barca, so our "maybe we'll do the quadruple" talk quickly turned into "fucking hell we better win the league now otherwise just a League Cup looks like shit for how well we've played".

4 year later and we're in the FA Cup against Wigan again. They've done us at Wembley, they've done us at The Etihad, will they do us at The DW? Mancini got done by them, as did Pellers, surely football God himself Josep Guardiola and his soon to be Centurions will be able to turn over a team not in the Premier League or the Championship but in fact League One? I was stood in the away end just in front of Aguero's Dad and son, what a load of shit they witnessed. Delph got himself sent off for being reckless, Walker fell asleep and known pyromaniac Will Grigg slotted past the imposing Claudio Bravo to send us out of the Cup and another year of "maybe we'll do the quadruple" to be put to bed until the following April. It kicked off at the end when the Pie Eaters ran on the pitch to celebrate, after about 10 seconds of flicking the V's and shouting "inbred!" a few times I quickly scurried back to the car and missed it.

Anytime we've not hammered United
Let's have it right - it's been a great decade against our nearest rivals. Since the 6-1 in October 2011 I have seen us play them in the league there 7 times, winning 5 times, drawing and losing once each - that in itself shows the difference between the two clubs this decade. Every single victory has been fully deserved as well, we've absolutely wiped the floor with them. That 3-0 when they had Moyes was not only borderline pornography to my eyes, The Chosen One's comments after saying they should "aspire to be like City" was tattoo on your forehead material. But as someone who unfortunately had to miss the November 2018 derby victory due to being at a wedding, I haven't seen City beat United at home for five years.

Every time they have come to us this decade we've been on paper miles better than them, and as things are right now and have been for quite a few years (since Ferguson left) you would have to say that only a near disaster at City would result in them finishing above us in the league, especially now with having that dinner lady as their manager. Having said that they've done us a few times. The one that sticks out is obviously the Van Persie one as that knocked the stuffing out of us and as our results faltered afterwards, but I'll let them have that as they were good enough to win the title that season. That time Rashford danced round Demichelis (who apparently turned 39 this week, I thought he was 40odd when he signed for us) to score, that 0-0 on a Thursday night, when we were winning 2-0 and could have been 5-0 up at half time, only to lose 3-2 and therefore couldn't win the title that day (I actually rate this day higher than the aforementioned Wigan cup final as the worst footballing day of the post-takeover era) and even this season where we lost 2-1 - you look at the teams and we should be leathering these. Maybe like Wigan they must have some sort of curse on us that you can only get by being supported by a load of badly dressed yonners, who knows.

I could go on about that 3-2 in April 2018 for some time. I never felt as high as that moment when Gundogan put us 2-0 up, I can remember the concourse in the South Stand vividly at half time, absolutely bouncing. It was all your dreams at once. It took me awhile to get over it to be honest, and it certainly didn't help that this game was between the two Champions League quarter final defeats against Liverpool. A real cunt sandwich if there ever was one.

Recruitment post-title wins
Fuck me we've spent some dosh on shite. True we've spent money wisely and we've built two really great Premier League teams, but the money we've spent when we're chasing title wins compared to when we're on top is ridiculous. Clichy, Nasri, Aguero vs Rodwell, Sinclair, Maicon is a great example of the difference between the summer of 2011 and 2012. Javi Garcia isn't remembered as a great City player by any stretch but he's soundly not in the relegation zone of that summer, whereas the previous summer we won 2 titles with those 3 players key to our success.

The summer of 2013 had 5 major signings - Fernandinho, who you could argue is one of the clubs best signings this decade, Negredo, Navas and Demichelis overall had a positive impact that season and Jovetic was a bit in and out, probably viewed as a flop but I didn't mind him that season. Then the following season we signed Eliaquim Mangala and Fernando, thus ending any trust anyone ever had in the Portuguese league. During the Winter window we signed Wilfried Bony. These three players would make it in to my all time underwhelming City XI or any negative XI you could put together. I mean fucking hell these lot were abysmal. Mangala, I'll give you that he had a debut (as did McManaman and he's considered by some as one of our worst signings of all time) and he played a few times in our 18 wins on the spin in 2017, but generally he was a proper liability. With Bony all you need to do is look where he's been since and how many goals he's scored. Literally the only positive thing I can say about Bony is he has responded to @MikeNumber5 DM-ing him on Instagram. Says a lot when the signings of that summer were a 36 year old Frank Lampard and Bacary Sagna on a free. I tweeted a picture recently of when we beat Bayern Munich at home after Aguero had scored his hat trick and he had Lampard, Jovetic, Mangala and Fernando around him - what an odd time, and no surprise that we didn't win the title that season.

We invested a lot of money in the build up to the Centurions season, quite a few years in the making with Otamendi, Sterling and KdB in the summer of 2015, Stones, Sane and Jesus in the summer of 2016, Walker, Bernardo and Ederson in the summer of 2017. But the summer of 2018 it was the often criticised Mahrez for what was then a club record transfer, and I don't want to slag him off too much really as he's not been that bad, but then he's not been that good, has he? (EDIT - bit of a sidebar to the point but I've had to mention him missing that penalty at Anfield last year as that deserves an honourable mention regarding shit moments of the decade) Doesn't really matter as we retained the title so happy days. Then the summer just gone and I know it's early days, I like the look of Rodri but he's not there yet, Cancelo cannot get a run of games together yet and this morning I've read that he's already "open for City exit", Angelino is what he is - a £6 million full back in a team without a left back. All in all a bit underwhelming and we find ourselves without having our Christmas turkey but 14 points off top. With the money and competitiveness of football you cannot stay on top forever but where we are today feels a bit disappointing.

Not doing anything in Europe
One of my favourite things is going across Europe watching City with my mates, this decade I have travelled to loads of different countries and cities watching City. I love it about as much as I dislike home Champions League group games. The weird "not sure if these are really City fans" crowd with some stranger standing next to me, the crap flat atmosphere, the groan at having to play Donetsk again. I, like a lot of fans, are not completely taken in by the competition and as I wrote many moons again (the day after the Roma draw in 2014) I never expected City to be in the Champions League when I grew up, so it's not exactly something I've dreamt about winning.

Having said that, I have seen us win a lot of trophies and this is the last one to tick off the list. Not only have we not won a European trophy this decade, we've not even been to a final. Considering the players and managers we've had, we've let ourselves down here. "But we've had difficult group fixtures!" Yeah we did under Mancini, but in the years since we've been heavy favourites to qualify to the next round - and we have. Getting Barcelona two years in a row wasn't an easy draw for us but you've got to play the best at some point and it's not like in either game we came close to winning. Our away performance at Real Madrid in the semi final has got to rank as one of the most disappointing 90 minutes of the decade. Monaco at home was one of the games of the decade, probably one of the most dramatic games I'll ever go to - but we went out there with a 2 goal cushion and were level by half time. The last two seasons we've played English clubs both who ended up as losing finalists but the first finished 25 points behind us in the league and the second 27 points behind us in the league.

Even without winning a trophy in Europe, Liverpool and Chelsea have played in 3 finals, United have won the Europa League and Arsenal and Spurs have played in European finals. Yeah I know we laugh at the Thursday night cup playing against a bunch of Bosnian farmers but I'd still like to see us win a cup in Europe, and hopefully this will change sooner rather than later!

The Academy
We've tanned a load of money on a great facility across the road from The Etihad where we were told all about a conveyor belt of young talent coming through. No doubt there have been some talented young players play for our youth teams but that has not turned into appearances for the first team. Even right now we're clamouring for the extremely talented Phil Foden to get a game in a midfield which is lacking legs and invention at times but he cannot seem to start consecutive league games.

I know you're in danger in sounding like a bit of a prick to demand youth players being in the first team over established stars, I'm pleased we bought Kevin de Bruyne instead of trying to turn Celina into a star but as someone who grew up with a lot of academy products in the first team and someone who likes to watch the younger teams play (paedo alert) it's a bit frustrating that despite all the money invested into the CFA we haven't had a regular starter.

The one that got away was clearly Sancho. When he eventually leaves Dortmund it will be for a massive fee. Would his career taken off in the same way if he'd stayed at City? Who knows - Frimpong who has gone to Celtic is another who in my opinion we'll regret letting go. There's been a load who have looked great at their age but we've either not given them a chance or they've gone to NAC Breda or Girona for a season and hardly set the world alight. In the same way you could look at Bony's career trajectory post-City you can probably look at Brandon Barker and think "well he probably wasn't worth giving a go" - but sometimes the right chance for a player at the right time can make or break a career. There's been plenty this decade who've looked the part at their age group, we've got to loads of FAYC finals but no one has nailed down a place. Hopefully in the next decade this will change, with players like Eric Garcia, Tommy Doyle and Jayden Braaf to name 3 impressing at different ages you would hope there's a lot more to come.

Constant price increases
As a City fan that follows them all over the country one of the best things to happen this decade is the introduction of the £30 price cap for away tickets. We almost take it for granted now but only a few years ago there were away games (looking at you Arsenal and Chelsea) where we were paying over £60 per game. I even remember seeing/hearing someone say "Everton is pretty cheap at £43" those of us who went to all the games when we were crap were hit hard as all of a sudden City were a Category A game, not Category C (i.e. who the fuck wants to watch these). If it hadn't been for this league wide price cap then there's probably a lot of games I would have had to sacrifice and miss out on.

City on the other hand have year on year increased the season ticket just a little bit, a tenner here, fifteen quid there so that without realising your season ticket now is a lot more expensive than it was 10 years ago. Those out there who think the club can do no wrong will shrug their shoulders and say "oh well it's only £1.50 extra on your monthly direct debit" or "well it's only an extra £3.57 per game" or even "well this is the price of watching good football" (as if they'd give us a rebate if we ended up outside the Champions League places). Have I given up my season ticket? No, and I'm sure anyone rolling their eyes at this might be quick to point that out, but City are taking the piss and I'm sure for a lot of people they're not far off their financial breaking point. I understand that the club need to be seen to increase match day revenue but that latest increase gave the club around £750k in revenue, the clubs overall revenue was £535m.

I don't see this changing in the next few years, they will keep putting it up, people like me will keep moaning about it and do nothing about it, gradually long term fans will stop being able to afford going week in week out and the characteristics of our fan base will change, which is sad and already noticeable at the higher demand away games.

Anyway, despite this being purposely a moan it has been a great decade watching City - here's to the 2020's being our decade as well!

The Man Who Would Be King

Growing up supporting City in the 1990's, you were told tales of the great players to have previously worn the blue shirt.

When I first felt the crushing blow of relegation in 1996, 20 years had past since Dennis Tueart had scored an overhead kick at Wembley to secure City a League Cup victory. That victory would be the last great day for many years, and it signified the end of a 8 year glory period for the club where we won the league, cups and in Europe too.

For the first 15 years of me being a match going fan I had to grasp on to the temporary crop of cult heroes with the knowledge that a legitimate legend may never play for City again. I loved Rosler, Goater and Benarbia, who are rightly adored as being City's heroes of their day, but they didn't achieve the sort of things which my Dad had seen when he was my age. Doyle, Summerbee, Lee and of course Colin Bell - the King of the Kippax.

City had moved on from this era and moved away from the Kippax. I doubted that we would ever see another "King". We all know the story of the developments of September 1st 2008 - when everything changed. But it still didn't seem real, and although the names and reputations like Robinho, Bridge, Given were bigger than before we still needed to achieve or for my generation be forever celebrating players who were just great servants of the club, not players who we could remember for the moments that you will talk about forever.

The summer of 2010 was a significant one for City. Having been within touching distance of qualifying for the Champions League that May, we went out and bought the players that we hoped would take us to that next level - to not only compete, but to win.

A lot of players will be remembered fondly from that transfer window; Balotelli, Kolarov, Milner but two in particular stand out. David Silva and Yaya Toure.

Little did I know at this point how important these two players were going to be. It will be a sad day when David leaves, but that day is not upon us yet, but for Yaya, the end is nigh.

And it wasn't just myself who didn't know how important Yaya would be. If you've never read this before, check out this article from The Mirror's Brian Reade - https://www.mirror.co.uk/opinion/football-opinion/brian-reade-column-millions-squandered-3353824

There's almost too much to say about Toure. He was absolutely vital for Mancini in the 2010/11 season. He was viewed as a deep lying central midfielder but Mancini looked at his attributes and played just in front of Barry and de Jong allowed Toure to be creative on the ball with his passing, and allowed him to break forward with such pace and power that hasn't probably been seen before or since on these shores.

With some players they have attributes such as pace or shooting ability, but some players just have that ability to score important goals. David Platt once described Edin Dzeko has having the ability to score "heavy goals", and when you're in the hunt for silverware, you need someone who can provide the heavy goals.

A sunny mid-April day in the capital against our bitter rivals for the right to play in the F.A. Cup final a month later. A game that City grew into, but there was not a lot between ourselves and United on the day. It was tight, if anyone made a mistake it could have been crucial. The recently-much-lauded Michael Carrick made this mistake and Yaya pounced on the loose ball, ran past Vidic like he wasn't there before megging Van Der Sar.

It's almost easy to forget with everything that's happened since this moment of jubilation what exactly this goal meant. Trying hard not to sound patronising here but the younger generation of City fans will never know what that feels like. We may well go on to do this and that in many different competitions, but that moment where City exploded out of the shadows by beating United will probably never happen again. All eleven on the day heroes, but it was Yaya who was the difference on the day.

4 weeks later and just as the nerves of "maybe this isn't going to be our day" were just about kicking round in your head, Yaya again almost burst the net with a goal at the same end, right in front of the blue end of Wembley. The F.A. Cup was City's first piece of silverware in 35 years. Thirty five fucking years. Some people don't live that long. It was an amount of time which our neighbours reminded us of regularly, and even had a banner mocking us. Hope they made the most of it at the time.

I could be wrong and there's no way of knowing otherwise, but in the same way that we all felt that without Dickov scoring those goals and Weaver making those saves in 1999 we would have been doomed, I think we all feel that if Yaya hadn't been the difference on those two days and City hadn't won the F.A. Cup in 2011 we might not be where we are today, 7 years later just days away from lifting our 3rd league title.

The Cup was the first thing. The next step was to be the English champions. City headed to Newcastle for the penultimate game of the 2011/12 season just barely on top of the league by 8 goals and 0 points. Newcastle were flying high at the time, and they knew that if they beat us and won away at Goodison the following week they had the chance to get in to a Champions League place. Mancini made the change to push Yaya further forward in an attempt to win the tight game between us and Newcastle. There's a story that Joleon Lescott tells about Toure assuring him the day before the game that he was going to score at St James', and he did. Twice. More heavy goals. Another huge day in my life where I was watching a really tight game of football and Yaya Toure was the difference. I recall clearly walking out of St James' that day knowing that we had done it. 44 years since we last won the title and we just had QPR at home next week to lift the title. Dead simple...

It didn't quite work out for City or Mancini the following season, not to say that Toure had a poor season at all, but City just didn't seem to have the right mentality as champions it seemed at the time - a trending theme as no club has defended the title since.

A new manager and a new style of playing for the 2013/14 season, one that will be remembered more than any other due to Toure's performances. Where do you start? Dominating United home and away, ridiculous goals of all types whether long range strikes against Fulham, Plzen and Sunderland in the League Cup final - a goal which is possibly the finest the new Wembley has seen, and sparked the turn around where City ended up winning 3-1 and lifting the League Cup for the first time since 76 - or lung busting runs against West Ham, Cardiff and Aston Villa. This final goal is particularly significant as it was a rainy May night at The Etihad where City found Villa hard to break down, but eventually got our noses in front with two goals from Dzeko. It was the 90th minute at the end of an exhausting season and Yaya picked the ball up in his own half and drove at Villa's heart like someone trying to kill a vampire, before smashing the ball into the back of the net to win the game 4-0 and put City 2 points at the top of the league with one game to play.

Throughout the whole of that season he was basically untouchable. Pellegrini made everything go through Yaya and that season it worked a charm as we won our first double since 1970.

There were great moments after this; the winning penalty in the 2016 League Cup final in particular stands out as well as great goals away to Villa in 2014 and Watford in 2016. But unfortunately he never really got to the same heights in the seasons following 2013/14. He was a victim of his own success in one way, and I have always believed the Pellegrini relied on him too much and over played him. When he joined City, he had just come off a World Cup, another World Cup in 2014 as well as what seemed like AFCON every year. Add that to him being over the age of 30 and being a huge bloke and I bet his body was exhausted at times in Pellegrini's final year. Elements of our support were getting on his back, which made me love him even more, but even then it looked like at the end of the 2015/16 season with Pep about to take over it looked like it could be the end for Yaya.

By all report he and Pep have a weird relationship. I won't get into all the tripe that Yaya's agent has spouted over the years, but he made it even worse in the autumn months of 2016. But then, when I had resigned myself to never seeing Yaya play for City again, Pep brought him back away to Crystal Palace in November 2016. Me and my mates were absolutely buzzing when we saw the team news. And after Yaya not having played for 7 months, what do you think he did? Scored 2 and again was the difference on the day. As he scored his second he ran over to the fans in the same he did when he scored there in April 2014 before our second title win, and fans ran on the pitch to celebrate with him. It was an emotional moment, something that I never thought I'd have - a true City legend - had returned and scored on his comeback. For the rest of the season he looked great, playing in a bit more of a reserved deeper role - probably something Pellegrini should have done 2 years earlier. He played that well that he was offered a 12 month contract extension.

So we get on to this season, where his appearances have been limited, but there's no telling what his winning influence would have done for the dressing room with a lot of the team being under 24.

It was announced on the 4th May, just 9 days before his 35th birthday that he will be leaving City after 8 years and that our final home game of the season against Brighton will be used as a send off to a City legend. A year ago, as Zabaleta was saying his goodbyes, I questioned whether the current crop of players had the personalities to take on the hero status' which Zabaleta had had before them and I think although no one is Zabaleta standard yet, they are doing their bit.

There's certainly players in this current squad with the ability to control games, score important trophy winning goals, and create moments like Yaya has over the years, but Yaya will always be remembered as the man that created those first moments. Without him, City wouldn't be the club they are today.

We will be lucky to witness anything like what Yaya Toure has done at Manchester City again, and for me and many others he is my Colin Bell, he is The King.

Thanks for the memories, Yaya.

Time For Heroes

Last night we saw a City great play his last game at The Etihad. Pablo Zabaleta was not just the Premier League's best right back for the 2010's though. He was a symbol of a link between the players on the pitch and the fans off it.

We all have our own stories as to where we were on the last weekend of August/start of September 2008. I woke up on the Monday morning and switched on Sky Sports News to see that Vedran Corluka was likely to make his switch to Tottenham as we had just bought a 23 year old Argentine attacking full back called Pablo Zabaleta. He, and the signing of Glauber Berti, got sorta lost in the mix of what was to come as City were taken over by new owners, reports of bids for Berbatov and David Villa being thrown around and eventually signing Chelsea-bound Brazilian play maker Robinho for over £30 million. Only 15 months earlier, City had finished a season with scoring 10 goals at home. Times were about to change significantly.

Not just on the pitch either. Garry Cook had reflected on the facilities of the club at Carrington needed a huge overhaul of improvements. Since the move away from Maine Road, the club didn't seem to have a direction apart from sell anyone of any worth. The only serious investment the club had been given until this point was the previous summer when former Thai president Dr. Thaksin Shinawatra had taken over from Wardle. We were a big PR stunt for Dr. T and despite being worth £2billion, he was actually skint. Typical City to get a skint billionaire.

Although not part of the club long before the takeover, Zabaleta walked into pre-takeover City. Not won a trophy since 1976 City. The City that I and a lot of people who will read this grew up with. I will be honest - I wasn't sure on him at first. I thought he went to ground too early and seemed like a mistake/red card waiting to happen, similar to how a lot of people view Otamendi now in a way. He moved from right back into midfield in the early part of 2009 scoring his first goal against Wigan in a 1-0 win. As time went past and the team gradually got better and better he wasn't always a starter, but you felt better when he was on the pitch. He played either side as a full back or could fill in in midfield. His work rate and determination made him able to be adaptable, and his adaptability made him popular with the fans as he never seemed to grumble about being moved around.

He and Micah Richards were battling head to head on a weekly basis for the right back position. Both loved by the fans at this point in 2012, but it wasn't clear who was ever number 1. The run-in for the 2012 title he made the position his own, and he pushed on to be City's player of the season in the 2012/13 season. From then until this season, he was first choice unless injuries played a part.

But what Zabaleta means to the fans is more than just a successful career. He embraced the club. He became a City fan. He loved Manchester. Opting to live in Didsbury over tucked away in a Cheshire mansion and often recalling how he'd go in the chippy and play pool in The Barleycorn before it shut down. He was on the pitch last night calling his son a Mancunian.

In the first half of his career he was lucky to be around people like Richard Dunne, Nedum Onouha, Joe Hart, Shaun Wright-Phillips and the aforementioned Richards as they had been part of the furniture at City for many years. But Zabaleta and Kompany, who had joined the club a few weeks earlier, became City people and the effect they had on the players purchased over the next few years is easy to see.

Seeing the faces of players like Joleon Lescott, Nigel de Jong, Mario Balotelli now warms the hearts of a lot of City fans because there seemed to be a bond between the players and with that there was a bond between them and the fans. Zabaleta mentioned the 1-0 win against United at Wembley as his highlight - when I think about that game I think about the players and staff running over to our end at Wembley and doing the Poznan in front of us. Something as simple as that goes a long way as a short term buzz and a long term love.

With Zabaleta gone, Joe Hart seemingly gone and Kompany on the edge of breakdown, the players who seemingly love the club are hard to be seen. Sometimes I watch these great players and it seems like they're at City on loan and going through the motions of a football career. I know people who really like players like Raheem Sterling, Leroy Sane and John Stones - the investment and ability of these three in particular suggest that they are players the club are pinning their hopes to for the future, but they don't have a bond with the support in the same way. They cannot have stood there last night taking it all in and not think "I want a bit of this when I go". They don't have that connection yet - and again I don't think this is anything to do with them not winning anything or ability. Now is their time to stand up.

Similarly with the manager. Find me someone who feels more positive emotions towards Guardiola than Mancini and you'll find me a liar. "This is for all of the fans" - Mancini said at about 17:00 on May 13th 2012, Pellegrini didn't say anything like that when he won the league and if we ever do with Pep, I doubt he'll say that, he'll probably say the football is amazing or something. Embracing the fans, getting the fans on side is important. Slagging off the size of the club, the atmosphere or the pressure is just bullshit excuses for your short comings.

I know some people "get it" and others don't. Frank Lampard, a legend of a rival, embraced the club more in the 12 months he was at the club more than Gael Clichy has in 6 years. It's just a fact of life and it's not for everyone - I've not mentioned my three favourite players in this whole blog because none of them are particularly like Zabaleta or Kompany but at the same time they do have a real connection due to their achievements on the pitch, hence why most games you hear chants of Sergio, Yaya or David.

Pablo is a legend but now a part of our past. I'm hoping last nights admiration of him and his legacy is to enthuse the current crop of players and staff to embrace the club and Manchester the way he did. If they don't they're in danger of leaving the fan base disillusioned.

R.I.P. The Deadman

Anyone that's ever read anything put out there by me is aware that my biggest interests are football and music. But I have to hold my hands up and say I have a guilty pleasure. I've had three periods of my life where I have had a love affair with professional wrestling.

Before you start, I'm very aware that the majority of 29 year old men that are still interested in this form of entertainment should probably have their hard drive examined. I know it's scripted. I know from the outside watching big guys fake fight in daft outfits for the purpose of a soap opera story line is frankly ridiculous. And it is ridiculous. I know it is. The enjoyment I get from it is something I cannot really explain in the same way I have previously explained a masterclass from David Silva or a lyric from Pete Doherty.

Similar to football and music, my awakening to wrestling began in 1994. When I think about my earliest memories, I cannot think much about starting school, but I can remember being sat with my Dad in the Main Stand when City beat Tottenham 5-2 in October 1994. I can remember hearing, "Whatever" by Oasis in December 1994. But first, I can remember Royal Rumble 1994. It was there I saw Yokozuna and many other wrestlers gang up and take out a character that I really took to. The Undertaker. In a time where most wrestlers were larger than life individuals with bright colours and over the top shout-y promos, The Undertaker was dark, mysterious and left the talking to his manager Paul Bearer. This mysteriousness is probably what attracted to me to Slipknot as a 13 year old before they took their masks off.

He was off screen for sometime, and other performers and future Hall Of Famer's Bret Hart and Razor Ramon got me further hooked on to this form of entertainment. The Undertaker returned at Summerslam in August 1994 to have a match versus an imposter Undertaker hired by The Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase. For years I believed this to be some of the most fascinating bits of entertainment, only to watch it on the WWE Network awhile back to realise it was in essence crap. But I was young and excited. The Undertaker was my favourite and I looked at him on TV in the same way I would look at Uwe Rosler, Niall Quinn or Keith Curle. My Dad took me to the NEC in Birmingham to watch it. He hated it, but I can still remember the feeling when the lights went off and The Undertaker's spine chilling entrance began. City weren't exactly giving me plenty of thrills in 1995, so this made up for it.

I've always had a good memory when it comes to useless information. I can almost track things in the world/life because I remember who City were playing round that time - maybe not to the same extent but I can almost do that with wrestling too. I stopped watching around 1996 for reasons I'm not sure. History tells me that the WWE was at a low point around this time, as Diesel and Razor Roman, two of the biggest characters of the era defected to rival company WCW. Around this same time, the amount I went to City decreased a lot. Not because we were going into our worst point in over 120 years of history, but because I was playing football myself at a later slot in the day for my local team. As good as my memory is, no wrestling and football have left me with a void in 1997 and 1998.

The 2nd love affair started in early 1999 (ironically as City went on our great run to get into the play offs and then win the final). I'm not sure what it was that got me watching again, but it was different to the show I had stopped watching. And I was hooked. It was a bit odd to see people like The Ringmaster now being Stone Cold Steve Austin, the face of the company. Some young guy called The Rock was a big deal (although no one would have predicted how big Dwayne would become). And my favourite The Undertaker had transformed from an almost Western mortician good guy to a massive goth bad guy in his role as the Lord of Darkness amongst his group - The Ministry.

I won't go into it too deeply on here, but this was during The Attitude Era - a time where WWE had shed it's family entertainment which got a 6 year old Liam hooked into a non-PG product aimed at teenagers and young men. The language and the content went hand in hand for a generation who watched South Park. I was 11 and the WWE was the most exciting thing on TV. And loads of my mates watched it too. When I was younger I was one of the few lucky ones who had Sky TV and I watched it all on my own. But I can remember loads of my mates watching Raw on Friday nights, staying up for Pay Per Views (PPVs) if we were off school. I used to set our VHS for the PPVs that were on during term time and I'd pass the tape round my friends during the next week.

My favourite PPV of all time is Fully Loaded 1999. The card for the night had big personalities and great characters littered throughout it and the main event was the top good guy Steve Austin vs The Undertaker - the top bad guy, in a first blood match. In hindsight, an 11 watching two grown man fighting til someone bleeds isn't probably on, but of course you didn't care at that age.

The Undertaker took a further change after a bit of time off to recover from injuries. His evil massive goth character was in need of a revamp, and in May 2000 at Judgement Day he made his return, now as a Harley Davidson biker character - a character closer to the real life Mark Calloway. He interrupted the last few seconds of a 60 minute Iron Man match between The Rock and the new biggest bad guy, Triple H. He attacked Triple H and his entourage who were beating down The Rock. The Undertaker came down to the ring on a motorbike with Kid Rock's "American Badass" song playing and basically beat up about 7 guys on his own - the sort of situation which is so unlikely to happen in the real world, but it perfectly acceptable in wrestling. Even 17 years later, I don't think I've seen a crowd react to a return to the ring like this (although The Hardyz coming back at Wrestlemania 33 was huge) - if you've never seen it, check it out.

Around 2001/2002 I lost interest again. The Attitude Era effectively ended when they decided to turn Steve Austin into a bad guy at Wrestlemania 17, and the "Invasion" story which happened for the following 6 months is widely considered the worst booking (sorry to use wrestling terminology, I've tried my best to avoid it throughout!) ever in wrestling. I was 13/14, music was becoming more important to me and as I was fortunate to look about 10 years older than I was at the time, I was the guy to turn to to buy alcohol. And sitting round parks drinking £1.89 4 litre cider seemed more interesting than wrestling...

And then we fast forward a lot to January 2014. Someone on my Facebook had shared a post from Mick Foley. Mick was one of my heroes 1999/2000 as Mankind, and his book "Have A Nice Day" was and is a great read, probably the first widespread publication to acknowledge wrestling being fake and gave an insight to every aspect about wrestling. Mick had slated the company for not putting Daniel Bryan in the Royal Rumble - 20 years after I first saw The Undertaker. I found this very interesting - someone so respected slagging off the company that he's always going to be connected with. In football terms it's like reading that Steven Gerrard has called Jurgan Klopp a waste of space, or something. Why has he said this? What's happened? So I did a bit of reading and watched Raw for the first time in 13 years. It was a different show to what I was used to. The language and content was a lot safer, but the athleticism was much improved. Without watching it all the time, I was interested in it again so I stayed up and watched Wrestlemania 30.

I could see Bray Wyatt had a big future in the company, and was really impressed with the three members of The Shield. But for me and many others the stand out moment was Brock Lesnar vs The Undertaker. Yes, him again. 20 years after I first started watching, The Undertaker was still as big and relevant as ever. His career actually started in the WWE in late 1990 and from then to 2014 he had a record of 21 victories to no losses at Wrestlemania - the biggest event of the year. The Streak as it was known had become a centrepiece match of wrestling, as big as a title match. It was thought that it would never end, but at this years event, Brock Lesnar beat The Undertaker. It was shocking, I remember feeling shocked and if you've never seen the faces of people seconds after the 3 count I encourage you to go to Google or YouTube and seek them out.

The mystery of The Undertaker had never gone away either. He spoke more than he did in the early 90's but he was still The Undertaker - he never broke character.

His performances were few in the years since I got back into it, however his appearance at Wrestlemania was always something to look forward to, despite the ending of The Streak. Fans fantasized about dream matches for him vs John Cena or Sting and now in his 50's fans speculated when he would retire.

In the build up to Wrestlemania 33 this last Sunday I scratched my head a bit about what was going to be the headline event for the night. As more matches went past I was thinking "When are they going to put on 'Taker vs Reigns?" About 2 hours into the 5 hour spectacle I wondered if they were going to go on last, and if they did, then would this mean the last match for The Undertaker? Well it looks that way.

As the match went back and forth, gradually Reigns had more control - the hinted at the Stone Cold heel turn (becoming a bad guy) vs The Rock at Wrestlemania 17 with chair shots to the grounded Undertaker and eventually Reigns pinned The Undertaker. Almost 27 years at the top in WWE over.

He took his hat, coat and gloves off and left them in the ring as he made one more walk up the entrance ramp. I wasn't emotional about it (in fact, I was bollocksed, I was on the train to Arsenal away at 10:20am and it was 5am the following morning by this point) but in the days since I've felt quite reflective that one of my first heroes has finally called it a day.

In footballing terms he's like the Buffon of wrestling; always reliable, been on top for decades and very much loved by those that respect everything they have achieved. They've been there through different eras of the sport but still maintain their popularity and relevance - probably a bigger achievement than any award, belt or cup.

Even if I fall out of love with wrestling again, I won't ever forget The Undertaker.