Manchester United supporters briefly chanted "If you go down to Man City you'll buy one get one free" - a reference to the apparent ease of obtaining tickets at the Etihad. Before half-time, it was the away section that was pockmarked by vacant seats. They missed another five goals.
A helicopter overhead captured the early departures filing out of the away section like a colony of ants. They had already seen United ship four at the same ground this year and United have conceded at least four in eight games within the last year.
How City fans would have loved the Etihad's sizeable screen to have mirrored the broadcasters and displayed Sir Alex Ferguson's expression at 4-0. The stewing Scot sat motionless, possibly suffering flashbacks of The 5-1 and The 6-1. City surpassed the former and briefly emulated the latter scoreline.
Read more: United player ratings from City hammering
"We want ten," City fans chanted with 15 minutes remaining. For more than a decade they have chanted "It should've been 10" and on this day it felt possible. The broadcasters homed in on Ferguson again at 6-1. Anthony Martial at least prevented a repeat of that scoreline with two goals.
That United's season is not defined by a derby is a reflection of how far they have fallen. Yesteryear, annihilation by City win was a seismic result. Now it is a near-annual occurrence.
"Tearing Cockneys apart again," crowed the City fans to Joy Division. United lacked substance until Antony scored stylishly and the sight of Casemiro and Martial waiting in their kits on the touchline was an extra fillip. The trouble was it was already 4-1. It got worse.
The City fans resurrected the Poznan but the stadium did not roar as deafeningly as at Maine Road in 2002 or, doubtless for those present, in 1989. A six-goal performance is almost an obligation for Pep Guardiola's supreme City. Some lowlifes sullied the celebrations by mimicking airplanes next to the away section.
For the second time this season alone, United skulked off 4-0 down at the interval. This was largely incomparable with the generational nadir of Brentford, such is City's superiority, but it will have alarmed those United supporters in the three tiers of the south stand how reminiscent their latest hiding was.
What will smart for Erik ten Hag is City denuded United more effortlessly than in March when mutiny was simmering under the interim charge of Ralf Rangnick. The start was so identical to that derby seven months ago City took only three more minutes to breach a porous United defence that survived for eight fraught minutes.
United's game plan was regressive, hinging on a breakaway or one of the four forwards creating something out of nothing. The starters did next to nothing.
The irrepressible Erling Haaland did everything, plundering a third hat-trick of his City career and chiding the United supporters who reminded him of his father's encounter with Roy Keane. It is already fair to place Haaland with Paul Gascoigne, Alan Shearer and Ronaldinho in the pantheon of greats that got away from United.
So familiar was Ten Hag's approach it was favoured by Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, only he oversaw three wins out of three at the Etihad. City's first goal stemmed from Jadon Sancho's sloppy dispossession and Bruno Fernandes did not have to look far to berate him as a celebrating Phil Foden eyed the crestfallen United fans.
Ten Hag has to make significant changes in response to this, which threatened to be United's joint-worst result in the Premier League era. City are responsible for two of those thrashings that neatly bookend the dominance of their neighbours over the last 11 years.
The refusal to integrate Casemiro, a £70million investment, five-times Champions League winner and, most crucially, the sole defensive midfielder in the squad, has been perplexing and now costly. Scott McTominay heroically blocked a goalbound effort during City's first onslaught yet he is a stop-gap rather than a specialist.
Ten Hag had already become so irked by United's deep positioning he stormed out of the technical area to order the defenders to push higher up. Raphael Varane was inside the six-yard area when Foden connected.
United's naivety was encapsulated by the second goal. City played on with Varane prone and nursing an apparent ankle injury, earned a corner, Varane had to depart the pitch after requiring treatment and Haaland nodded in the game-killing second goal with his direct opponent a spectator. The dam burst with Varane's injury and he was replaced at 3-0.
Guardiola and Ten Hag were identical in almost every manner of their appearance on the touchline bar their communication. Ten Hag was largely stoical, though could not completely conceal his dismay, stuffing his hands into his pockets and shaking his head as he sought advice from his assistants.
He admonished Tyrell Malacia, who endured a more chastening first-half at left-back than Patrice Evra did on the same turf in 2006, during a stoppage at 3-0. Malacia was alarmingly distant from Foden off the ball at kick-off and off the pace for his second and City's fourth goal. Like Evra, Malacia was hooked at the pause, a different kind of enforced substitution.
The atmosphere was edgier as kick-off, with Keane and Alfie Haaland a goalframe apart pitchside. An overseas broadcaster unsuccessfully attempted to reunite the pair and Haaland, also formerly of Leeds, did not utter "United" during an interview with a Swedish touchline reporter.
Haaland, soaked by the sprinklers, swerved Keane and ascended the steps to take his leather-padded seat in the hospitality section, where he celebrated his son's goals jubilantly.
You'd buy a ticket to watch Haaland.
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