ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE FINAL DAY: Manchester City 3 QPR 2:THE ONLY word to describe it is bedlam. Manchester City are the champions of England but where do you start?

How, seriously, can it be possible to sum up the raw, shredded emotion of those final, exhilarating moments, the scale of what it means and the sheer drama that unravelled before the party could begin and the Premier League trophy was in Roberto Mancini’s hands? There can be only one other moment to compete with this and it was Michael Thomas’s title-winning goal for Arsenal at Anfield in 1989.

Mancini’s team played with their supporters’ nerves to the point of brutality. They were 2-1 down going into stoppage time, on the verge of a defeat so harrowing they would never have been allowed to forget it. There were supporters leaving the ground in tears, scarcely believing the team could have been so reckless.

What happened next was so extraordinary it is difficult to know if there are enough superlatives in existence to do it justice. Edin Dzeko’s header to make it 2-2 came in the 92nd minute, at a point when the crowd were watching in almost numb disbelief.

On the sidelines, Mancini and his coaching staff could be seen imploring everyone to go forward, desperately relaying the news that Manchester United were winning at Sunderland. Except City had played dismally all afternoon, consumed by nerves against the team with the worst away record in the league. Queens Park Rangers had fought back from a goal down, despite the latest red card for the Joey Barton portfolio of shame.

The London club have avoided relegation courtesy of Stoke City’s draw with Bolton Wanderers but their manager, Mark Hughes, described himself as “flat” later on, still trying to work out how his team had been beaten. City, he said, had “lost all direction”. He, like everyone else, was bamboozled by what had happened.

It goes like this: four of the five minutes of extra-time had elapsed when Sergio Aguero found himself with the ball. He was inside the penalty area, on his right foot, and it was then that everything suddenly seemed to go into slow motion. This was the moment football blurred with pandemonium.

His shirt was off, the victory run had started and the stadium was a mosh pit of flailing bodies. City had wrenched the title out of Manchester United’s grasp, with 60 seconds to spare and the Etihad Stadium crowd roared and sobbed and bounced and screamed.

When they have time to take a deep breath City will reflect that they really ought to have made this a far easier assignment once Pablo Zabaleta had moved forward from right back, six minutes before half-time, and fired in a shot that looped off Paddy Kenny’s glove and dropped in off the far post.

The entire complexion of the game changed three minutes into the second half when Shaun Wright-Phillips flicked a hopeful pass forward and Joleon Lescott’s mistimed header allowed Djibril Cisse to run clear. The striker advanced towards Joe Hart and thumped his drive beyond the goalkeeper.

What followed was extraordinary even before we reached those final, stupefying moments. After 55 minutes Barton tangled with Carlos Tevez on the edge of the penalty area and the Argentinian went down, clutching his face.

Referee Mike Dean brought out a red card and the strange thing was that QPR actually improved once Barton was sent off, with City showing all the signs of panic despite playing against a team with the worst away form in the Premier League.

City were tense, nervous, rushing passes, unable to find their usual rhythm despite having a huge amount of possession. Then, on 66 minutes, a sudden, damp silence fell over the stadium as QPR broke, the substitute Armand Traore crossed from the left and Jamie Mackie’s header gave the away side the lead.

After that, there were periods when City seemed devoid of ideas but, to their credit, they always kept going. Everyone in the stadium knew United were winning and that, if this was the return of “Cityitis”, it was going straight in at No 1 in the list of games that would always haunt them. But then the board went up for extra-time and football, bloody hell.

Guardian Service