Nothing won but looking good

Manchester United 2 Everton

Who wouldn’t be, with a return ticket to Madrid nestling in the back pocket, whether figuratively or literally? But after Barry and Hart’s attempts to succeed those other infamous Blues, Little and Large, in the mirthmaking stakes, who could blame us for striding down Warwick Road yesterday with the confidence of would-be conquistadors? !

Everton were dispatched in a manner I thought we’d abandoned some time ago: with businesslike application and brow-furrowed determination from minute one. The defensive solidity was especially impressive, for the third time in recent weeks after months of shipping goals: David de Gea had hardly anything to do but did it well when he had to.

And in Rafael, we have a dark horse candidate for our player of the season — well, the runner-up, anyway.

So, 12 clear with 12 to go; you’d have to be Kevin Keegan to blow the gaff from that position. Keggy himself popped up on BBC radio over the weekend to join the cast-list of other miserable ex-City personnel in the media performing a rendition of The Fat Lady Sings, though you won’t catch me doing the same just yet.

It’s pure superstition, to do with the pagan worship of a god called Todya, discovered several years ago by a chap on the Red Issue website and now followed by hundreds of us. I’ll spare you the complicated and hilarious story of how this cult came about but, in short, you never ‘call’ a match or a title until even quantum physics throws its hands up and says “we give up: it’s all yours.”

When it’s the equivalent of being four goals up with two minutes to go, we’ll join the rest of you. Until then, as we adherents always say: “never taunt Todya”. No matter whether Paddy Power’s paying out already.

Barcelona has the trendiness factor and the sea but Real Madrid feels more like a truly capital bastion that defies all-comers, with a sense of brooding menace. We’ve never won there, of course, though 1968 was a triumph; then again, we’ve only been there four times in 56 years. It is this combination of Madrid’s austere, regal glamour with the rarity of our confrontations that makes this such a spine-tingler.

Of course the Ronaldo and Mourinho factors add further spice but they are merely fleeting here-today, gone-tomorrow personalities. Madrid v Manchester is about the clubs and the cities: the institutions, their traditional values and their historic deeds. And though I say this every time we embark upon a particularly momentous voyage, it doesn’t make the wish any less fervent: let us play, and behave, in a manner that honours our predecessors of 1957 and 1968. Whatever the result, that would entirely satisfy me.