Ben Foster was trying his best to communicate, trying to funnel messages through to his Watford team-mates, anything that might help to slow momentarily the siege but it was a futile exercise. He looked around and all he saw in front of him were shell-shocked faces and scrambled brains. Manchester City were gorging themselves and Watford, individually and collectively, were completely overwhelmed - dazed, confused and physically and mentally bruised. Pure beauty was also savage.

“You can try [to talk to them] but you can just see that the barriers come up and that’s it,” the Watford goalkeeper said. “There’s nothing you can do or say to get through to them. It’s a human response, they close off. It’s so hard to try and change the mentality when that sort of stuff is happening. You can see it in them. You’re not used to dealing with this kind of thing.

“It was absolutely no fun. As a goalie, coming here in the first place, it’s almost an achievement to keep it at one or two goals. Like all the best laid plans, after 50 seconds, it went straight out of the window, and it was carnage.

“To go 5-0 down after less than 20 minutes, I was thinking ‘God, this could be double digits’. I was over the moon to get in at 5-0 at half-time. From a goalie’s point of view, it was just relentless. You could see them opening us up and the chances developing in front of your eyes. It could have been a cricket score. They’re without doubt the best team I’ve ever faced.”