ALL the big clubs have their ‘thing’ – their historic achievement that they love to laud over rival fans. Arsenal have their unbeaten league season. Liverpool have the most major trophies of any English side. Manchester City have their 100-point league season. Tottenham have that time they put pressure on Chelsea to finish second. And – on top of the most English top-flight titles – Manchester United have always had their unique league title, FA Cup and European Cup/Champions League treble of 1998-99. But sadly for Red Devils fans (and gladly for any rival supporter), that looks likely to come to an end this Saturday.

Having already bagged the Premier League title and the FA Cup, Manchester City face Inter Milan for the UEFA Champions League final with the Citizens overwhelming favourites to lift the trophy. According to Opta’s predictor model, Pep Guardiola’s side have a 73.5% chance to see off the Italian giants.

‘Champions of Europe’ has a lovely ring to it, but is it really fair to say the Champions League winners are the best team in Europe? The last three times an English side has won it they’ve finished 6^th, 2^nd and 4^th so haven’t even been the best team in England (while Chelsea in 2012 were only the third best team in London). However, you’d be hard pushed to argue that Man City don’t deserve that accolade this season, with more wins, more goals and the tightest defence in terms of chances given up among teams in the big five European Leagues.

While they don’t necessarily have the biggest squad, they certainly have one of the strongest – which other side for example could bench players with the quality of Julián Álvarez, Riyad Mahrez and Phil Foden for an FA Cup final? However, it’s still the performances of individual players that have caught the eye this season. Erling Haaland has 52 goals (a record in a single season for a Premier League player) and is averaging one goal every 78 minutes played.

And even though his goals have dried up recently – he’s scored just once in his last seven appearances – Ilkay Gündogan has stepped in. The City captain has scored six goals in his last six matches, one more than he had in his first 44 appearances this term.

Not only do Manchester City have the leading scorer of goals this season, they also have the leading creator of them, with Kevin De Bruyne providing a whopping 28 assists so far this term.

Adding someone who loves scoring goals to someone who loves creating them may just be the simplest thing Pep Guardiola has done as Man City manager, but it’s certainly reaping its rewards. In fact only PSG pair Kylian Mbappé and Lionel Messi have combined for more goals than the Man City duo among the big 5 European leagues this season.

Another player enjoying a fine campaign for Manchester City is Jack Grealish – he’s created more chances than any other player in the Champions League this term, while it’s also the most on record (since 2003-04) by an English player within a single campaign.

Grealish has also been fouled more often than any other player in the Champions League this season (29), while only rivals AC Milan (168) have conceded more fouls than Inter (150), an area that City could potentially target in Saturday’s showpiece.

We’ve already mentioned Manchester United being the only English side to complete the treble (league title, main domestic cup and European Cup), and should Man City emulate them it would be the 10^th time overall it’s been done.

Celtic were the first to do so in 1966-67, with Jock Stein’s ‘Lisbon Lions’ beating Inter Milan 2-1 in the European Cup final. The Bhoys also won the Scottish League Cup that season, making them the only quadruple winners in this list. Something Man City could have been this season were it not for Nathan Jones’ Southampton (take a note of that one – will be a pub quiz question for years to come if City are successful).

Pep Guardiola is no stranger to the treble having done it in his first season with Barcelona in 2008-09, beating Manchester United 2-0 in the final with a front line of Samuel Eto’o, Lionel Messi and Thierry Henry. He would be the first manager to achieve a treble on more than one occasion should his Man City side prevail.

While the above table shows that – if they were to do it – Man City aren’t the most dominant treble winners in history, their total wins, win rate and goals records makes Man Utd’s look positively average. Alex Ferguson famously called them ‘noisy neighbours’ when they came into some cash – 10 years after the Scotsman left the Red Devils, it looks like they might finally be deafened.