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The head of BT Sport has made a Twitter apology to Manchester City fans after a flier promoting the company's Champions League coverage failed to even mention the only Premier League club left in the tournament.

Simon Green has come under fire from supporters of the Etihad club in recent weeks for the TV station's use of former Manchester United stars Rio Ferdinand and Paul Scholes as pundits for City games – with both men not even bothering to try to hide their dislike of the Blues.

Now a promotional leaflet sent out to promote the knock-out stages of the Champions League mentioned Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United – but not City.

It read: "BT Sport is the only place to see every game from Europe's elite club competition. While it's been a tough campaign for the English teams – Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United were knocked out before spring had sprung – Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Real Madrid are among the teams to have sparkled. Expect more from them all the way to the final."

BT Sport's failure to mention that City are still flying the flag for England – they face Real Madrid in the semi-finals tonight – has not gone down well on the blue side of Manchester.

Green took to Twitter two weeks ago to defend his company's decision to rely on former United stars like Ferdinand, Scholes and Michael Owen for their Champions League coverage following the Blues' quarter-final victory over Paris St Germain.

Ferdinand had openly admitted that he wanted City to lose, while Scholes and Owen were hardly gushing in their praise.

(Image: BT Sport) (Image: Getty Images)

But Green felt compelled to apologise on Twitter last night when challenged about the BT flier.

He Tweeted: "Yes, APOLOGIES. This was an agency piece of marketing that was wrong. Rest assured that we want City to win the Champions League."

In an earlier Twitter conversation, Green told City fans that their criticisms of BT Sport's coverage smacked of 'paranoia.'

But Mirror Football understands that the TV station's coverage of the club has not gone down well in the corridors of power at the Etihad either.

There is a feeling at City that BT pander to clubs like United, Arsenal and Liverpool because of the huge fanbases they command and see the Blues as an easy target to get viewers on their side.

They believe that presenter Jake Humphrey gave the game away after the win over PSG when he said to Scholes and Ferdinand: 'Now we've quite rightly criticised Manchester City numerous times this season so we should quite rightly praise them – as hard as that is.'