Silva leads the hunt as Pep’s Lisbon lions roar to statement win

ONe day it is going to happen, you do know that. A team cannot be as good as Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City and keep finding ways not to win the Champions League.

This was another landmark display. Whatever the weaknesses of Sporting Lisbon, to come away and win by five was a remarkable achievement.

No team has ever led by four goals at half-time away from home in a Champions League knockout tie. Sporting actually took a walk around the ground in front of their cheering fans at the end.

It was as if they had done quite well to keep it to this rout of a scoreline. That was the gulf between these teams.

Maybe Guardiola senses the inevitability, too. Indeed, it could be City’s best way of keeping him, this inexplicable avoidance of club football’s biggest prize.

Perhaps Guardiola stays until it happens, in the knowledge it surely will. Could be this season, in

St Petersburg. Could be next. It must be coming.

Sporting Lisbon are not the worst team. They lie second in Portugal’s top division.

Their coach, Ruben Amorim, is credited with breathing vibrant life into the club, their youth policy has long been credited among europe’s best.

City had them 4-0 down by halftime, in their own stadium. Some of the locals were already on their way home by then, others were applauding the away team. Yes, even those players that were sired by their hated rivals Benfica. They know their football around here. They knew that they were watching a special team.

It wasn’t even as if Sporting were entirely terrible either. Going forward, particularly down the right, they had their moments without ever threatening ederson.

City, however, mopped up and kept them at a safe distance, the odd individual error aside, recording their first clean sheet of this european season.

At the other end, though, it was mayhem — the hot knife through butter. every time City got into the final third they looked like scoring — and on a majority of occasions, they did.

Sporting did not know what hit them. Sebastian Coates, late of Liverpool and Sunderland, is their captain. That should have been the clue. Coates wouldn’t get near City’s team.

None of Sporting’s defenders would. Guardiola (right) has swept up the cream of Portuguese talent in defensive roles. One imagines he won’t be returning for any of those here. City got a break via

VAR for their first goal and were helped by a deflection for their fourth but it would be wrong to suggest Sporting were unfortunate.

Frankly, it could have been more. It helped that City’s league game prior to this was against Norwich, allowing Guardiola to rest key men, but this was a statement performance from the tournament favourites.

In the part of the pitch where it counts, City were a different class.

They took the lead after a mere eight minutes. Bernardo Silva — one of the ex-Benfica men — played Phil Foden in on the left and his shot forced a save from Sporting goalkeeper Antonio Adan. It came out to Kevin De Bruyne in an advanced position and he picked out Riyad Mahrez to convert his sixth European goal this season, albeit into an unguarded net.

At which point, the flag went up. De Bruyne offside it seemed. And so we waited. And waited. And waited for VAR clarification. Players began doing stretching exercises to avoid cramp. Serbian ref

Srdjan Jovanovic stood, whistle in hand, unable to restart the match without instructions. Finally, from the German VAR team, the verdict came. Jovanovic signalled a goal. It was an unnecessarily long delay — and downhill all the way for Sporting from there. City could have scored a second three minutes later. De Bruyne found Raheem Sterling whose chip picked out John Stones, who had remained in a forward position after a set-piece move had broken down. It was an easy clearance but Coates missed his kick and the ball trickled just wide. Sporting regrouped — but it didn’t last long. In the 17th minute, Mahrez — who is arguably in the form of his life in a City shirt — took a corner from the right that was only halfcleared, looping up in the air to the left of the area. While Sporting ballwatched Silva reacted as if shot from a cannon. He rushed the ball, struck it on the half-volley, and saw it fly past Adan, striking the underside of the bar and bouncing down over the line, tickling the net as it went. What is it about hitting the underside of the bar that makes every goal seem more beautiful? This drew gasps, it looked so good. It was a supermodel of a goal.

For Sporting, it was now just a matter of how many. In the 32nd minute, Mahrez once again — what a game he had — worked the ball from the byline into the six-yard box despite the presence of two Sporting guards.

There, Foden got the better of Coates once more and as good as ran the ball into the goal, before shooting into the net.

The fourth came a minute before half-time. Sterling found space on the flank and cut the ball back to Silva, clearly relishing his more advanced role and perhaps a chance to take chunks out of this opposition. His shot went through the legs of Goncalo Inacio, clipping one on its way through and diverting the ball past Adan.

It took City into record-breaking territory. It is two years since UEFA tried to bar City from European competition and the whispers of jealous rivals will hardly subside after this.

The second half began in similar fashion. Silva looked to have completed a rare hat-trick with an even rarer header from De Bruyne’s cross after 50 minutes but this time VAR smiled on Sporting and disallowed his effort. It could do nothing about City’s fifth, though. What a goal it was. Sterling had just missed a header from a good position, but this is a City team brimming with confidence. So when Sterling collected a pass from Silva in the heart of Sporting’s half, he wasn’t thinking about that miss but how to eradicate it. He glanced up, saw the gap that had opened and let fly with a fabulous curling shot.

If the goals then dried up it was simply because City had no further need of them. They were done, this tie is done, Sporting were well and truly done.

Away goals no longer count double in the Champions League but City have no need for mathematical trickery. They were simply on another level to Sporting. If this performance is any evidence, they may really have to work hard to dodge the trophy this time.