Manchester City booked their place in the Champions League final thanks to a brilliant 4-0 second-leg win over Real Madrid on Wednesday.

The Citizens are 1/5 to win their first Champions League title when they take on 7/2 shots Inter Milan after eliminating holders Real 5-1 on aggregate with a stunning performance at the Etihad Stadium.

Pep Guardiola's men had thumped RB Leipzig 7-0 and Bayern Munich 3-0 in their previous two European home games and their semi-final display against Real inspired us to look back at some of the other greatest Champions League performances.

Barcelona 2 Manchester United 0 - 2008/2009 final

Manchester United fans must have feared the worst when Pep Guardiola arrived at Manchester City, having witnessed the brilliance of Pep's Barcelona team at close quarters.

The Red Devils were on the receiving end of a tiki-taka masterclass in the 2009 Champions League final in Rome, where Barca lined up with a front three of Lionel Messi, Samuel Eto'o and Thierry Henry and a midfield trio of Xavi, Andres Iniesta and Sergio Busquets.

Xavi and Iniesta would go on to inspire Spain's maiden World Cup triumph the following year and United couldn't lay a glove on the Barca playmakers at the Stadio Olimpico.

Eto'o gave Barca the lead in the 10th minute and the diminutive Messi headed home a Xavi cross with 20 minutes to go as Guardiola's men became the first Spanish club to win the Champions League, La Liga and the Copa del Rey in the same season.

Two seasons later United suffered a similar fate as they were outclassed 3-1 by Barcelona in the Champions League final at Wembley.

Barcelona 6 Paris St-Germain 1 (6-5 on aggregate) - 2016/17 last-16 second leg

By 2016/17 Guardiola had moved on but Messi, Iniesta and Busquets were still firing Barcelona to breathtaking Champions League performances.

Their European run looked set to end in the round of 16 after a 4-0 first-leg defeat away to Paris Saint-Germain.

Barca needed something truly special to turn things around at Camp Nou but Luis Suarez's third-minute goal gave them a glimmer of hope.

Early in the second half they were 3-0 up, thanks to a Layvin Kurzawa own goal and a Messi penalty, but in the 62nd minute Edinson Cavani scored a seemingly crucial away goal, leaving Barca needing to score three more times.

The minutes ticked by and Neymar's 88th-minute free kick appeared to be a mere consolation for the hosts.

The Brazilian then converted an injury-time penalty, meaning Barca were one goal away from a miraculous comeback, and five minutes into injury-time unlikely hero Sergi Roberto got on the end of a Neymar cross to make it 6-5 to Barca on aggregate.

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Real Madrid 4 Juventus 1 - 2016/17 final

Real Madrid fans have enjoyed eight Champions League triumphs since 1998 and one of their most comprehensive victories of the modern era came against Juventus in the 2016/17 final. 

Cristiano Ronaldo, inevitably, gave Real the lead in the 20th minute but that was the Spanish giants' only shot on target in the first half and Mario Mandzukic equalised for Juve, finishing off a brilliant passing move with a stunning volley.

Real had won the Champions League the previous season, and would go on to complete a hat-trick of titles in 2017/18, and their second-half performance really was the stuff of champions. 

They had 13 shots at the Juventus goal after the break and strikes from Casemiro, Ronaldo and Marco Asensio secured a comfortable 4-1 win in Cardiff.

Bayern Munich 8 Barcelona 2 - 2019/20 quarter-final

As this list shows, Barcelona have been involved in some of the most dramatic Champions League games of recent years but the 2019/20 quarter-final is one they would like to forget. 

Most pundits expected a tight contest when Barca and Bayern Munich met in a one-off quarter-final in Lisbon but the German powerhouses had other ideas.

Backers of both teams to score were celebrating after just seven minutes as Thomas Muller's opener for Bayern was cancelled out by a David Alaba own goal.

Just after the half-hour mark, though, Bayern were 4-1 up through strikes from Ivan Perisic, Serge Gnabry and Muller.

The rivals traded goals early in the second half before Bayern compounded their opponents' despair in the final 10 minutes with a Robert Lewandowski header from a Philippe Coutinho cross followed by two late goals from Coutinho, a player on loan from Barca.

Liverpool 4 Barcelona 0 (4-3 on aggregate) - 2018/19 semi-final second leg

Barcelona's 6-1 win over PSG was known as 'La Remontada' – 'the comeback' – but Liverpool can rival that effort with the Miracle of Istanbul, when they came from 3-0 down to beat AC Milan in the 2004/05 Champions League final, and their 2018/19 semi-final success against Barca.

The odds were stacked against the Reds after a 3-0 first-leg defeat at Camp Nou as only two teams in the history of the competition had overturned a three-goal deficit to win a semi-final tie.

Divock Origi's early goal gave Liverpool supporters something to celebrate and Anfield was rocking once a quickfire second-half brace from Georginio Wijnaldum levelled the tie at 3-3. 

Barca were shellshocked and Liverpool took full advantage of the visitors' defensive disarray as Trent Alexander-Arnold's quickly-taken corner picked out Origi to round off an extraordinary comeback.

bet365 News Team

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