Manchester City had it within their grasps to reach the Champions League semi-finals on Saturday.
It seems staggering to think that when Pep Guardiola's men never actually led during their quarter-final defeat to Lyon, but there were chances galore for City to secure progression in Lisbon.
From the moment Lyon gave their English rivals a wake-up call through Maxwel Cornet's opener, the power shifted back to the favourites and Kevin De Bruyne quickly started pulling the strings.
Man City 1-3 Lyon
After teasing the French side with a fizzing free-kick and stunning pass to Raheem Sterling, the Belgian eventually penned his name on the scoresheet with a fine, right-footed equaliser.
From that points onwards, everything seemed to resemble a series of unfortunate events for City and nothing to suggest that they're anything less than cursed in the Champions League.
Firstly, there was VAR controversy - when has that ever happened to City in Europe? - when Moussa Dembele's first goal survived both claims of offside and a foul on Aymeric Laporte.
Everything went wrong for City
And secondly, Dembele's next strike, which ultimately put the game out of reach, came courtesy of an uncharacteristic error from Ederson after he failed to handle Houssem Aouar's initial shot.
However, the most unfortunate moment of all transpired just moments before Lyon scored that very goal and it came in the form of Sterling having a golden opportunity to bag an equaliser.
And when we say a golden opportunity, we really mean a gold opportunity because the ball was fizzed across the six-yard box to give Sterling the sort of chance he's gobbled up all season long.
Carragher reacts to Sterling's miss
On this particular occasion, though, the England international inexplicably fired over the crossbar and sparked scenes of shock from football fans around the world.
And two gentlemen who were particularly bamboozled by the miss were Jamie Carragher and Micah Richards with their animated reactions being captured in the CBS Sports studios.
We could try and breakdown why their particular reactions have gone viral but frankly, we're not even going to attempt to do the delirium justice, so check it out for yourself down below:
Look. At. Carra's. Face.
You'd be mistaken for thinking that the Liverpool legend had just walked into a crime scene or was trying to embody Edvard Munch's 'The Scream' for a game of charades.
Either way, we're pretty sure Carragher wasn't alone in going through the emotional rollercoaster of being certain that Sterling was going to score only for him to, well, not score.
And it's a perfect example of how the beautiful game can be so cruel because Sterling has played out the best season of his professional career only for it to sadly end on such a gutting moment.
As far as we're concerned, though, one anomalous break in character, albeit at a crucial time, doesn't take away from an incredible campaign which has reaped 31 goals in just 51 appearances.
Chin up, Raheem.
