Man City ultimately did not actually take a bus from London back to Manchester.
Although it was only a little over three hundred kilometers, the journey would have taken four or five hours, and it would all have been in the middle of the night.
Under normal circumstances, that would not have mattered much. But the team was about to rush to Dublin for the Europa League final, making the players' recovery especially important. Not just a few hours—even a few minutes were precious.
After the match, the team bus took everyone to nearby Heathrow Airport. They boarded the chartered plane the club had arranged long ago and flew directly from London back to Manchester.
The families of the players and employees, along with the guests invited by the team, flew back to Manchester from London in separate groups.
They would all be traveling with the team to Dublin as well.
This was also one of the benefits extended to players' families and club legends.
As long as the team got good results, no one would care about something like this. After all, winning a championship was more important than anything else.
What professional teams competed over was influence—or, one could say, fame. And that had to be built on results.
No matter how loudly one's reputation was trumpeted, being exposed on the pitch and beaten into submission by an opponent would make it all meaningless.
This was even more true for a newly rising team like Man City.
The night they arrived in Manchester, the team did not disband. Instead, they checked directly into the hotel that had been booked in advance.
The next morning, the team assembled at Carrington for a recovery session.
Teams that trained scientifically would schedule a recovery session the day after a match.