The devil is in the details. Manchester City arrived at this Round of 16 game against Borussia Monchengladbach with a record of 18 consecutive wins in all competitions. It's such an astonishing feat, particularly following their very clumsy start this season, that the method in which those wins were achieved doesn't get discussed.

When Liverpool were on the verge of getting their own Invincibles season in 2019/20, they were wild, constantly pressing and often needing a hope and a prayer to snatch last minute goals. In contrast, Manchester City's hot streak has been produced through clean and precise domination.

From the opening whistle, City got a hold of the ball and used their possession so well that the times Monchengladbach had the ball felt as if they were given the ball intentionally so Pep Guardiola could move his men into better positions to take it back and attack again.

His 4-2-3-1 formation was bossed by the midfield pair of Rodri and Ilkay Gundogan; Rodri with deep pinpoint passes, Gundogan with probing runs up into the Monchengladbach defense. Going forward, he set up goal threats with the front four and, tracking back, he defended his left channel from any forward ball movements. Whatever Pep has done to him in the past few months has turned him from a great midfielder to one of the world's best players.

City's control over the game was evinced in their first goal. Joao Cancelo caught a bad clearance and responded with a swinging, diagonal cross into the box where it was headed in by a free Bernardo Silva. Silva, at 5' 8", isn't exactly a threat in the air, yet he had so much space he only needed to get under the ball's shadow to knock it in.

This didn't ignite any kind of charge in Manchester City. They celebrated a gorgeous goal and then got back to work. Monchengladbach probably would have liked to get fired up and get into the game. That was smothered by City's business as usual continuation.

When the game restarted after half time, the Germans had a burst of aggression. This exception to the flow ended up showing how in charge Manchester City were. This change of pace only effected Monchengladbach, City stayed on their rhythm, ensuring that aside for a scant few solid chances, their intensity remained impotent.

Around the hour mark, Denis Zakaria started to break the City back line and it was enough for Marco Rose to make a double substitution: Stefan Lainer for Valentino Lazaro and Alassane Plea for Marcus Thuram, two defensive players out for offensive ones.

Immediately, City took hold of possession and worked down the pitch where, again, Cancelo made the exact same cross to Silva who was further forward than before and knocked it across goal to let Gabriel Jesus tap it in. Rose must have rued his decision to get rid of Lainer.

Monchengladbach were 2-0 down to Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga earlier this season and came back to win 3-2. That was achieved with a rally late in the first half that carried over into the early second. There were only 25 minutes remaining and they had spent the first 65 under the thumb. Top scorer Lars Stindl came off in the 73rd minute, figuratively raising Monchengladbach's white flag.

As City reached their 19th consecutive win, the question of how to beat these titans became even more difficult. Pep's garbage time substitutions included Sergio Aguero, returning from weeks of injury and reminding everyone that we still haven't seen Manchester City's final form.