Real Madrid v Manchester City: City millionaires left bankrupt by performance of real poverty

In a sea of genuine soccer largesse, this was a match in which Manchester City sank without a trace. Without even a notion of a raging against the dying of the light. For a squad assembled for such hectic evenings at such heady venues, it really was no way to lose.

It is fair to say there will be no Real regrets for Zinedine Zidane’s boys, who must be wondering how they only ended up winning a hugely one-sided Champions League semi-final aided by a Welshman who is only marginally less noticeable than Tom Jones.

In a match between the two richest football clubs in the world, City were short-changed by a group of multi-millionaire players who squandered their opportunity with an impoverished, listless and impotent performance that was utterly devoid of the necessary minerals required to take the next step.

Eight years on and over a billion pounds of Abu Dhabi investment later, City have yet to find the strategy to pass go in Champions League monopoly. Yet in the land of funny money, this latest failure is no laughing matter.

The world’s greatest club tournament tends to give short shrift to a side whose lack of creativity, initiative and fizz were marked. City's one-paced approach made you wonder how they stumbled to this late stage of the event without being rumbled earlier on.

Real Madrid will rightly take their place in the Champions League final alongside city foes Atletico Madrid – their second meeting in the continent’s elite final in the past three years – when Milan becomes Madrid for a day on May 28.

Undecima (number 11) could yet be on the cards two years after they flogged Atletico 4-1 over 120 minutes to clasp La Decima. The Madrid sides are also involved in a three-way joust for La Liga with Barcelona, who will yet be assured of the title if they win their final two matches.

For City, there is not even a hard luck story to fall back on. No matter how you try to dress this up, City departed as the poor relations having failed to give this their best shot.

For now, the European dream has died another rotten death on a night in which City’s corpse barely twitched after Gareth Bale had helped to deliver the killer blow on 20 minutes with an effort that fairly hurtled beyond Joe Hart via a post after a deflection off Fernando, who was later credited with an own goal.

From the visiting point of view, Dani Carvajal was allowed a disgraceful amount of time and space to pick his pass for the evening’s decisive thrust.

Bale’s effort was a moment of good fortune, but no less than Madrid deserved for an energy, purpose and willingness to press and do the hard yards that was missing all night from Manuel Pellegrini’s team.

Sergio Ramos and Pepe have never had it so good. In a match in which City needed to score to keep alive prospects of reaching the final after a 0-0 draw in the first leg at the Etihad a week ago, the Real Madrid central defenders enjoyed a greater sense of security than King Felipe.

Much will be made of City losing their captain Vincent Kompany to a muscle injury in the opening 10 minutes, but one man would not have altered the condition of this contest. If it was not for Hart to Hart in Manchester and Madrid, City would have been out of this match long before stoppage time. Not that Madrid were fretting on haemorrhaging an away goal.

As if to illustrate their superiority, Marcelo opted to throw a cross over in the third minute of four added on rather than take the ball for its traditional walk towards a corner flag. Madrid knew they had City’s number, and also their numbers.

The English team managed only one effort on target all night, a ridiculous output for a night in which a rabid and vociferous gathering of Madrid fans rocked the team bus outside of the stadium and held up white cards inside it before watching City turn in a ghostly display.

Sergio Aguero might have rescued it late on for City when he thumped a shot a yard over from distance, but it would have been an act as outrageous as Florentino Perez's loyalty to his managers if Zidane was denied his chance to win the trophy he hoisted above his head as a Madrid player back in 2002.

City fans had warmed up for their side’s big night by dusting down a new ode to incoming coach Pep Guardiola in the Madrid sunshine, a catchy ditty which is sung to the tune of 60s hit Glad All Over by the Dave Clark Five, a track Pellegrini perhaps enjoyed back in the day.

“We’ve got Guardiola, yes it's Guardiola,” sung a few of the City followers while the Cruzocampo was going down in a quicker time than Kompany lasted out on the battlefield. This must have been have a sobering experience for City’s sunburnt followers.

Ah well, at least City fans are left with the song. And of course Guardiola.

Rather than salivate over the arrival of Pep, City were badly in need of a pep talk here. Maybe Pellegrini tried. Maybe his men could not respond. Whatever is said now, Pellegrini's time at City has well and truly gone. Others may join him.

Bale, Luka Modric and Cristiano Ronaldo were all hugely vibrant and valid for Madrid, but City possessed men who seemed interested in running personal projects.

Yaya Toure was substituted for his lack of energy while Kevin De Bruyne was largely irrelevant, knocking one free-kick into the side netting with it crying out to be thrown into a crowded area.

Raheem Sterling’s delivery was generally wretched after he emerged from the substitutes' bench, but he was involved in an incident that should have prompted a red card for Lucas Vazquez, who disgracefully lunged at the England winger with two-feet like he had just stolen his bank card.

No matter, Madrid fans were already busy looking out the bunting.

Guardiola has major remedial work to shape this City side into one capable of storming places like the Bernabeu. A blue night for the men from the blue moon as the party fell flat before it even got started.

“The party's over, it's time to call it a day, they've burst your pretty balloon. And taken the moon away.”

Rather than Blue Moon, The Party’s Over is a more apt lament for the unsatisfactory nature of City's latest demise.