Manchester City showed they’re learning to master the dark arts during their draw with Bayern Munich

Manchester City swapped silk for steel in the Allianz Arena on Wednesday night and it was striking how much they seemed to enjoy the aggressiveness of the Champions League tie.

How much they relished playing the role of villains as they held Bayern Munich at bay and booked their place in the last four.

In these ties, on the biggest stage, Pep Guardiola always stresses to his City squad that there will be moments in which they have to ‘suffer’. By that he means they cannot dominate a Bayern Munich team for 180 minutes, and certainly will not be able to when meeting Real Madrid in a semi-final rematch next month.

Any team with true designs of winning this competition has to dig in during the knockout rounds, hold on when opponents are running all over them — as Bayern did in the first half at a raucous Allianz Arena. But City also needed to do the nasty stuff, the feisty stuff… and they did it well.

This has happened before, with the goalless draw secured at Atletico Madrid in last year’s quarter-final, but not something that is necessarily associated with a team who play such glorious football.

Manchester City proved they are learning to master the dark arts in their draw with Bayern

The English champions were clever in the way they won free-kicks and slow the game’s pace

In Bavaria, there was a steel and edge to their work. When the prolific Erling Haaland scored the opening goal of the second leg — his 48th of the campaign — the Norwegian happily goaded the home fans as beer rained down on him from the stands. 

While that was going on, Kyle Walker was becoming embroiled in a heated row with a few locals as he jogged up and down the touchline.

Haaland was not finished. He also screamed in Bayern midfielder Leon Goretzka’s face when City won a corner shortly after. That was presumably some form of retribution following the mind games by Goretzka in the build-up to Haaland’s missed penalty which he ballooned over the bar.

So there was that bite but also a greater sense of game management. The substitutes also played their part in winding up the hosts, wasting a few precious seconds when City won another corner, Phil Foden diverting the ball away from Kevin De Bruyne as he trotted over to take the set piece. Kalvin Phillips was giggling at his team-mate.

Ederson also picked up his second booking of the season for time wasting against Bayern. Just like during the victory over Arsenal at the Emirates in February, the City goalkeeper lingered for a bit too long when returning the ball to play and received a yellow card before half-time.

And all from a group of players who an exasperated Guardiola effectively said could not mix it when he complained in January that they were a ‘happy flowers team’ — only interested when the tide was with them.

That remark may have been exaggerated to make an overriding point. City had just come back from two goals down after 45 minutes at the Etihad to beat Tottenham 4-2, so showed proper gumption — but they have dropped just five points in the Premier League since and it has clearly worked.

Pep Guardiola’s side were adept in time-wasting throughout the encounter at the Allianz Arena

‘We had a conversation,’ midfielder Rodri said. ‘It’s not enough to play good, you need to punish. I remember the game at Nottingham Forest (a 1-1 draw), these kind of games cannot happen. 

‘That is where we have improved: to finish the games. You’ve seen it in the last months that almost every chance we score. Sometimes when you have bad news or bad moments, it can make you grow.

‘You can learn. From that moment we switched on and you see it now, the behaviour and the character of the team. The basics in modern football right now is that you have to be aggressive, you have to be solid.’

And streetwise. Although how much they have got to grips with the murky side of the game will become clear when they play in the last four against holders Real — the masters of the dark arts.