Pep Guardiola insisted through gritted teeth that Manchester City's defeat and elimination at the hands of Real Madrid was not his last stand in the Champions League. Which is just as well, because this was not a fitting way for him to say goodbye to a competition that he took to a whole new level with Barcelona and has won three times in total, only trailing Carlo Ancelotti.
Guardiola's expected departure from City at the end of this season has been the elephant in the room throughout this season, but the coach has always given it short shrift. And he was in no mood to entertain the rumours after his side's 2-1 defeat on Tuesday, which capped an emphatic 5-1 aggregate loss and a third successive knockout loss to Madrid.
"Oh, everybody wants to fire me, right? Oh my god, guys! One day I will come here and say, 'Bye bye, guys!' And still I'm here, one more year of contract," was how he responded to a question about his future, while he also declared: "Next season, we will be back".
His pithy response was a reminder that Guardiola will leave on his own terms, but the question that remains to be answered is whether he can bear to leave having only won Europe's biggest prize once with City.
Bernardo Silva's summer departure actually feels more inevitable than Guardiola's, and the captain was the main villain of the night, his sending off killing the tie after just 20 minutes. Guardiola bemoaned the red card and penalty award that came with it, but Madrid just got on with things, above all Vinicius Jr and Thibaut Courtois.
Things often seem to fall Madrid's way in this competition. How Guardiola would love to have such luck in the Champions League, which somehow still seems to find new ways to haunt him.
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