Manchester City leave Brighton in a spin after passing festival in an FA Cup semi final victory.

Manchester City leave Brighton in a spin after passing festival in an FA Cup semi final victory.

In the end it was almost too comfortable for words although the score line would suggest otherwise. Sometimes this season Manchester City have been so good that anything other than an emphatic victory against any opposition would have constituted abject failure. But the slender margin of their FA Cup semi final victory against Brighton still has a meaning and resonance that goes beyond what they to think goes a long way in proving that the Quadruple of FA Cup, the Carabao Cup already acquired, the Premier League and Champions League is well within their capabilities.

As the noisy blue and white flags and banners of both Manchester City and Brighton fluttered almost ceremoniously in the stiffening winds of a packed Wembley Stadium, the immediate thoughts turned to a City side who could still be caught in the Premier League title by Jurgen Klopp's superbly disciplined and gracefully incisive Liverpool and a Brighton side who just want to be beside the seaside.

Occasionally Brighton's more wistfully regretful supporters must have gone back to that agonising FA Cup Final in 1983 when only Gary Bailey and Manchester United stood between Gordon Smith and near certain victory. Sadly, Smith's rush of blood to the head may continue to haunt their every waking moment. With only Bailey to beat from a couple of yards, Smith scuffed the ball and a Cup Final winning goal would remain out of the Scotsman's reach.

At Saturday tea time Chris Houghton's well drilled and plucky Brighton side were almost undone before they'd had time to get their feet under the table. How can a team who have been so outrageously and technically superior for the last two seasons make a potentially awkward FA Cup semi final against a well balanced Brighton side  look like a walk in the park?

By the first quarter of an hour of this first FA Cup semi final the game was all but over. Manchester City had scored the only goal of the game, Brighton looked slightly ruffled but looked at once as though they'd been covered in chloroform or had just taken a very sleepy sedative. City, without ever looking imperially imperious, still showed us their most royal purple when it looked as though they'd got fed up with just passing the ball between themselves.

There were moments in this match when the contest itself assumed the air of a training exercise, a frivolous five a side match, a fun packed exhibition that just fizzled out in no time at all. In fact here was a match between a side who had privately resigned themselves to defeat and one convinced that all they had to do was turn up on the day and just win the game with their eyes closed.

When Gabriel Jesus stooped to head home a low cross from the left after some quick, quick slow passing, Manchester City took hold of possession and conducted some of football's most melodious of attacking symphonies. The game now seemed to drift into a daydream. Once Manchester City had the ball at their beck and call, this FA Cup semi final lost both its shine and polish.

 City were arrogant, dismissive, boastful and totally relaxed. They, metaphorically at least, seemed to put their feet up on the chaise longue, smoked a languid cigar, opened up the Financial Times to check up on the current financial health of their Arab owners and then swigged back their cognac with the most disdainful air. How dare Brighton challenge their obvious supremacy when the whole world knows that not even Watford can beat them in this year's FA Cup Final?

Pep Guardiola, City's Spanish emperor-cum boss, still looks like a man who quietly believes in the impossible, still demanding more from his team even when it looked as if his team had refused to move out of first gear. The job had been done and there had been no need whatsoever to do any more. The grey stubble on Guardiola's chin looked so suitably chic that had somebody told him to go out and buy another Armani suit for the FA Cup Final he'd have probably agreed with them.

With Nicholas Otamendi striding and swanning around the central areas of Wembley in complete control of Manchester City's defence and midfield, City retained an almost vice like grip on the game. Once Benjamin Mendy and the constantly inventive Benjamin Mendy had tipped the balance City's way, City were a model of dapper sophistication.

Then City's tormentor in chief and most majestic string puller Kevin De Bruyne began to cast a spell on the ball as if at some point he was about to hypnotise it. De Bruyne was at his most bewitching and when the game seemed to be beneath him, he just stopped to gather his thoughts. De Bruyne appeared at times to glide and float into space almost angelically. Throughout the game De Bruyne's influence was spiritual, forever hovering around the centre circle without ever playing the harp.

Once the exceptional Aymeric Laporte and Ilkay Gundogan had demonstrated a model display of strength and robust athleticism, Manchester City were easing themselves into the remainder of the game as if it would have been rude of us to ask them to take any further part in this match. City swaggered and strolled, picking their moments to attack, slowing the game down when it felt right for them and then reeling Brighton in like a prize trout near a river bank.

Now it was Bernardo Silva who began to run rings around a failing, tiring and faltering Brighton team, cutting inside from the flank, jabbing passes correctly and accurately all the while. Meanwhile the now veteran David Silva, always composed and ever available for any ball that came his way, became a re-assuring presence whenever City needed the experienced touch on the ball.

And then Raheem Sterling, surely the most exemplary role model in recent times, gave football another shot in the arm. Sterling was everywhere, dribbling the ball with unerring cleverness and waltzing his way in and out of the Brighton defence as if they were simply thin air. Sterling  danced and pirouetted his way through the Seagulls defenders, darting and dashing, pausing and scheming, a confounded nuisance. At times he reminded you of another City legend Peter Barnes who would shuffle and body swerve his way past players without so much as another thought.

So it was that we reached the final stages of the game with City blissfully content to play keep ball and draining the life force out of this FA Cup semi final. At times Manchester City looked like those kids from the 1950s who would kick that huge leather ball around in the road until late into the evening oblivious to their parents. Brighton reduced to launching desperate attempts to picking City's pockets only to find that City had already snatched the ball back and taken it home.

The one blot on the day was the booking of England defender Kyle Walker who locked horns viciously with his opponent and had to be visibly restrained from any further punishment. But Brighton had now lost their way and only sporadically ventured into the City half with any real intent. Antony Knockaert toiled industriously for the South Coast club but looked as if he simply couldn't find the nimble feet that for City had come so naturally.

But it's Watford against Manchester City in this year's FA Cup Final showpiece. Memories of Sir Elton John, boater hat on head, sobbing his heart as the raw emotion of Cup Final day took its toll, still linger in the mind. Watford, who had come back from two goals down against surely one of the teams of the season in Wolves, will return to Wembley 35 years after Howard Kendall's Everton had beaten them quite conclusively.

For those of a neutral disposition this is one of those FA Cup Finals where your heart tells you that the team who should win quite easily are bound to encounter one or two problems. Realistically Manchester City should treat an FA Cup final as a state occasion. You somehow expect the gold carriages to turn up on the day but if Watford can remember the example set by Graham Taylor then anything may be possible. We can only hope that the Watford Gap doesn't become a massive chasm. Manchester City would do well to remember the Wigan pier.