Pep Guardiola can't have enjoyed many days in this most forgettable of Manchester City seasons, so when the chance came to celebrate in the sunshine he was determined to take it.
Guardiola celebrated enthusiastically in front of City's superb travelling support, joking with his players and wrapping them in hugs before orchestrating the singing.
He saved the biggest embrace for last with Nico O'Reilly, the man of the moment as the 20-year-old helped to turn the game around after the break. Guardiola left the pitch to the sound of his own name being sung, punching the air back towards the supporters.
This felt like a big day in City's season. Not only did it secure another Wembley appearance and an FA Cup semi-final with Nottingham Forest, but he showed they can take prosper against "modern football".
They did so by changing approach at half-time and upping the intensity. It turned this fixture into a classic game of two halves and City's second half display was up there with the best they have produced this season. It didn't look like it was coming at the break.
Guardiola wanted width from his full-backs but got very little threat from them in the first half. Matheus Nunes' radar was off and Josko Gvardiol struggled to get forward down the left.
One Nunes cross did find Erling Haaland, but other than that there was little danger out wide from City, when it was clearly an area they wanted to exploit. Enter cup specialist O'Reilly.
He made two surging runs down the left in the first five minutes of the second half and the second created the equaliser for Haaland. It was classic modern full-back play and showed City are capable of fighting fire with fire.
Earlier this season Guardiola had listed Bournemouth as one of the clubs who play "modern football", suggesting his own positional ideas were becoming outdated.
"The way that modern football is, is the way that Bournemouth play, the way that Brighton play, that Newcastle play, like we were \[playing\], that is modern football," he said. "Today, modern football is not positional, you have to ride the rhythm."
That is exactly what City did in a second half performance that was night and day from the first. O'Rerilly offered that rhythm and the Blues rode the wave. They were suddenly dominant in a way they hadn't been in the first period.
Then, an ageing centre midfield had been run all over by Bournemouth's team of energetic pressers. They couldn't settle into the game and certainly couldn't find any control.
But as Guardiola had hinted, control is not the winning formula it used to be. Guardiola had packed the midfield at the Vitality Stadium but it was out wide where the space was.
O'Reilly was the difference maker. His second assist was very different to the first but again showed his quality, a clever reverse pass finding Omar Marmoush in acres of space.
You don't associate recent Guardiola teams with using full-backs to make powerful runs down their own channel, but that is what O'Reilly offered. He came infield as well and linked play, but he knew when to inject tempo into the game and when to offer some control.
The introduction of O'Reilly brought more physicality to the City side as well. They had struggled with that in the first half and it has been an issue in their game. With their control ebbing away, they have struggled to match the intensity of opposition teams.
That was the case in the first half on the south coast, but it changed after the break. Suddenly they were snapping into tackles and happy to go into the trenches to fight for possession.
That change in attitude helped to produce a stunning turnaround, not only in terms of the scoreline, but the flow of the game as well. City's sudden show of strength allowed them to dominate the game and they ended up cruising into another Wembley date with no real concern in the final stages.