It has taken about six weeks for Erling Haaland to go from being compared to Darwin Nunez to being spoken about in the same breath as Lionel Messi.
There really has been no choice, with the Norwegian banging in goal after goal at a level that English football and even the Champions League has never seen. As Pep Guardiola said ahead of this game, his record is undeniably the best for his age.
City's manager has had the pleasure to coach one of the greatest in the game when he coaxed the best out of Lionel Messi over a decade ago, and you suspect that whatever Haaland achieves in the game Messi will always be No.1 for the boyhood Barcelona fan and player who saw his coaching career take off with the Argentine phenomenon at his right hand. As with anything involving Haaland though, be wary of making any cast-iron predictions.
Also read: City player ratings vs Copenhagen
Guardiola was asked how the two compared after Haaland's hat-trick in the derby, and said that while the Norwegian needs his teammates to score goals Messi could do everything on his own. This is probably true - despite his reputation in the Bundesliga, it is unlikely to see City's No.9 slaloming past opponents in the way that Messi has throughout his career.
And yet, at City, it doesn't matter. They don't need a player to do everything for them because not how Guardiola has built the unit, it is a collective machine designed to create chances.
It has been finely tuned over the last few years to be the dominant force in English football and one of the leading sides in Europe, but at the same time has been missing that vital cog at the top to make everything look as simple as it does on the rest of the pitch.
In an instant, Haaland has emphatically changed that and is in the process of changing what we should expect from a top-level goalscorer in English football. He has started all 12 games this season and picked up his 18th and 19th goals of the campaign to take the game away from FC Copenhagen before being retired at half-time before he has the chance to rack up another cricket score.
There was nothing complicated about either goal - or, rather, there didn't look to be. He found space in the box to rattle in Joao Cancelo's cross in the seventh minute before being in the right place to react when Kamil Grabara could only parry Sergio Gomez's shot.
But if it looks straightforward, it is because Haaland has instincts like nobody else to be where he needs to be and the technique and ability to finish it off. There is a reason his goalscoring record is so much better than anyone else's.
City's breaking down of Copenhagen of course owed much to the team. Ilkay Gundogan conducted the orchestra masterfully and Gomez and Jack Grealish combined well on the left again; Gomez will try and claim the third goal even if it took two deflections on the way in.
Aymeric Laporte, making his first start of the season after recovering from knee surgery that he underwent at the end of last season, was felled in the box in the second half to allow Riyad Mahrez to step up and convert a penalty. And it was nice to see Cole Palmer given a full half to shine on his favoured side, allowing him to weave inside and show what he could do.
Another sweeping move gave Julian Alvarez his first goal since his last start when he netted twice against Nottingham Forest, the Argentine in the right place to turn the ball home and excellent work from Grealish fed Mahrez. Grealish still needs to get more goals and assists, but it is three terrific games in a row and counting after his previous against Wolves and United.
As much as City made a spectacle for it for the crowd that had come in, and as much as Copenhagen tried to manage a consolation, the second half had no edge to it precisely because of Haaland's work in the first to finish off the chances that he was presented with. After Palmer came Rico Lewis and Josh Wilson-Esbrand from the bench, with Phil Foden and Kevin De Bruyne among those who weren't needed with the result already secure.
If it seemed a few years ago like Messi would solve all of City's problems (and perhaps he would have done), Haaland looks the perfect player that this team needed for right now and the years to come. He is the gamechanger that takes this team to another level.
Already, Champions League qualification looks in the bag thanks to his five goals in two-and-a-half matches. City will travel to Denmark next week thoroughly expecting the fourth win that will confirm their qualification for the knockout rounds with two games to spare.
Southampton are next up at the Etihad but eight days after that there is the weighty task of going to Anfield to play a struggling Liverpool: win that one and the Blues can feel even more confident about this season. If they are to succeed at a ground where they have so often struggled, their new No.9 is likely to be central to it.
Guardiola will doubtless be asked about Messi again before too long, because finding fresh angles on Haaland is already proving difficult just months into his time at the club. Whatever he says though, however interesting, will not take away from the reality that City have now entered fully into the Haaland era.
The Champions League wasn't ready for what Guardiola and Messi brought at Barcelona. It remains early days but stopping Guardiola and Haaland could be similarly futile for the rest of football.
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