Jack Grealish was at the heart of Manchester City’s title-winning celebrations on Monday night, and his hilarious cameos will certainly go a long way to making him a fan’s favourite
England international Jack Grealish was at the heart of the celebrations on Monday evening as Manchester City paraded the streets with their Premier League trophy.
The playmaker appeared a little worse for wear on the evening, but that definitely wasn’t going to stop the £100million star from lapping up the celebrations. City had to work very hard on Sunday to ensure that the league title would be lifted at the Etihad Stadium outfit – with a quickfire 3-2 comeback against Aston Villa ensuring that they topped the table by a point and crushed Liverpool’s hopes of winning the quadruple.
Despite being a rotational player this season, Grealish was the centre of attention at City’s trophy celebrations – and he kickstarted an iconic series of events by laying into his teammate Bernardo Silva. The Portuguese midfielder was replaced by Ilkay Gundogan in the 68th minute against Villa when 2-0 down, shortly before City turned things around – and Grealish didn’t hesitate to let everyone know his thoughts.
Speaking on the open-top bus parade through Manchester, with a voice that could have been easily mistaken for Sean Dyche’s, the former Villa captain said: “The main person that I want to thank is Bernardo Silva for coming off in the 70th minute because he was miles off it yesterday.”
John Stones and Kyle Walker found the comment particularly amusing and were seen laughing amongst themselves at the jibe. The comment soon filtered back to Silva, who later on in the evening filmed a response, saying: “Keep Grealish on the f***ing bench,” – much to the amusement of Grealish, who fell about laughing with Silva.
During that discussion, Grealish also appeared to aim a thinly-veiled dig at Newcastle midfielder Miguel Almiron. The City ace, while mocking Silva’s performance against Villa on Sunday, could be heard saying “we had to take him (Silva) off, because he was playing like Almiron.”
That wasn’t the only time that the 26-year-old had his teammates in hysterics on the night. Grealish was the loudest voice in a chorus of players singing ‘We are the champions’. That, of course, sounds standard enough – but it was made all the more entertaining considering Grealish was wearing a scarf dedicated to himself which had his face printed all over it.
As the Manchester tour concluded, the City players were then called onto a stage one by one to receive applause from the admiring City supporters – and Grealish couldn’t resist the limelight on that occasion too. The former Villa star danced onto the stage, bouncing to the beat of the background music, with a bottle of beer in one hand and a vodka and coke in the other.
Clips of Grealish celebrating through the night will indefinitely appear on social media feeds into Tuesday morning. And whether the playmaker manages to keep hold of his sunglasses, that one would expect is hiding a smidge of tiredness and the effects of the celebrations, remains to be seen.
Grealish made 26 appearances for City this season, scoring on three occasions and assisting one. Given the enormous price tag, he will be hoping to kick on from the campaign and begin to fulfil expectations at the Etihad Stadium – though those thoughts will certainly be left for another night as Monday’s party is only just beginning.
The midfielder wasn’t alone in celebrating either. The players and staff, decked in City’s sky blue and holding the Premier League trophy aloft, waved at fans from an open top bus as confetti rained down and blue smoke flares were lit along the route.
“It is amazing, to do this for the fourth time. We couldn’t really do it last year because of COVID but amazing to see so many people here to celebrate with us,” midfielder Kevin De Bruyne said.
“The players have pushed me all the way. I’ve been here seven years and I love them. I have three more years and I’m definitely staying, this is where I want to be and win more trophies.”
Manager Pep Guardiola also joked it had been part of his plan all along that Manchester City should fall 2-0 behind against Aston Villa as his side celebrated their fourth Premier League title in five years.
The boss appeared on stage puffing on his now customary cigar to thank fans. “It was the plan, 0-2, calm, calm,” Guardiola said with a laugh. “And after we scored it was a great night.
“Everybody knows what has happened is an incredible achievement. This is the toughest league, in six years since we arrived we had four. The happiness on all the faces is the greatest reward we can get.”
After Ilkay Gundogan struck two late goals, either side of a Rodri goal, to give City the win, Guardiola was seen in tears at full-time as he celebrated with his backroom staff.
“Definitely it was a tough moment,” he said. “Always the players show again, it was incredible to come back. There was a lot of tension in the last month after (the Champions League defeat to Real Madrid) and a lot of difficult games. We never give up and we have to be so proud of the group.”
