Manchester City at the World Cup: One Blue Remains

The quarter-finals of the World Cup flashed across our screens in what seemed like a blink of an eye and with it, came the end of the participation of nine blues, all of whom should now be safely home.

It was inevitable that at least one City player would make it through as Nathan Ake’s Netherlands faced Julian Avlarez’ Argentina. And it was the latter who triumphed, albeit through a penalty shoot-out at the end of what turned out to be a bad-tempered match between the two.

The Argentine’s were two goals up and seemingly through when the Dutch hit two late goals and forced extra time and penalties. Argentina won and Ake was looking forward to facing Liverpool next week.

Joining him on the plane home was Ederson. His Brazil side allowed a goal advantage to slip, then completely fluffed the resulting penalty shoot-out to Croatia. The City keeper had no part in the shoot-out as the world’s best keeper did what he did best - and failed to save any of Croatia’s spot-kicks.

City’s Portuguese contingent were on Saturday’s flight as Morocco continued to stun the big guns. Having beaten Kevin de Bruyne’s Belgium and Rodri and Laporte’s Spain, Morocco became the first team from Africa to reach the semi-final with a 1-0 victory that saw Joao Cancelo, Ruben Dias and Bernardo Silva booking their flight home, and Cristiano Ronaldo keeping the desert environment well and truly watered.

They’re coming home, they’re coming...

City boys are coming home. Did anyone truly expect England to beat current world champions France on Saturday? For once, Kylian Mbappe was upstaged by a brilliant performance from the referee who should have won the man of the match award.

The three lions lost another quarter-final, this time to France. It does mean that Kyle Walker, John Stones, Phil Foden and Jack Grealish all made the plane back to Manchester, unless Jack and Phil found a bar somewhere.

Welcome home boys, let’s get ready for Liverpool.