Manchester City grasped it and now sit atop the globe, their era of dominance crowned by the one frontier they had yet to conquer.
The best team in the land and all the worldread a banner that immediately lit up on the side of the Etihad Stadium, more than 3,000 miles away
Melo had been spoiling for a fight ever since the game started getting firmly away from an enterprising Fluminense, who responded promisingly to conceding through Julián Álvarez within a minute but had little hope of keeping the score down.
Before half-time the City keeper was required to make a stunning one-handed save from Nino’s header. Unfortunately for Nino, the center-back, he had recently made an impact at the wrong end.
Manchester City had begun to wrest back control of the game and, when Rodri found Phil Foden in yawning space on the left side of Fluminense’s penalty area, danger beckoned.
Phil Foden seemed caught between crossing and shooting but his drilled ball became an assist when it snicked off Nino and plopped into Fábio’s far corner.
Eighteen minutes from the end Álvarez centered hard, meaningfully, from the left and a dashing Foden converted emphatically. With a raking low drive near the end, he applied the final gloss.
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Thus Manchester City were crowned and the life of this curious seven-team tournament drew to a close.
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