How do you report on an FA Cup final that’s completely devoid of tension?

The defining image of Saturday’s FA Cup final was not Vincent Kompany lifting the third trophy of a remarkable treble-winning season for Manchester City.

Nor was it Raheem Sterling’s celebration as he toasted what he thought was a hat-trick just yards from where he grew up outside the stadium.

The picture I’ll remember was an altogether different one.

With minutes to go and City’s near-total dominance on the Wembley turf neatly reflected on the scoreboard above, the cameras panned to Pep Guardiola in the home dugout.

What we all saw was not a man jubilant in a historic victory but one looking on through his fingers. This wasn’t exuberance, it was near embarrassment.

This was the look of someone wanting mercy from the dogs he had sent to war, a man who had just walked into a surprise party that he had organised himself.

It’s not Guardiola’s fault, of course – how would you react to something you were certain you were going to see?

Such a one-sided contest, in the loosest sense of the term, presents its own problems for journalists. How do you report on a cup final completely devoid of tension?

“Finals are meant to feel different,” Jack Pitt-Brooke wrote, “and this just felt as if a routine home win at the Etihad had for some reason been relocated to Wembley for the day.”

There have, of course, been cup final routs before. Arsenal vanquished Aston Villa in 2015, for example, but not like this.

From the moment City goalkeeper Ederson denied Roberto Pereyra one-on-one in the first half, the result was all but beyond doubt.

City showed the precision, the focus, the unerring ruthlessness that they have brought to almost every game they have played over the last two years.

The champions have taken 198 points and scored 201 goals in the last two league seasons put together. They have now beaten Watford nine times in a row. More than ever this feels like the reality we must now grow to expect.

For the first time in history, the titles in Europe’s top five leagues have been retained. This is not the outlier, it’s the new norm. And we as fans and journalists must change with it.

Yours,

Ben Burrows

Sports news editor