SOMEHOW they got there.
Even when everything was against them – including, it seemed, referee Robert Madley – Manchester City survived.
It took penalties, another nail-biting shootout for City’s reserve squad to book their place in the Carabao Cup semi-final.
Jamie Vardy, who equalised 96 minutes into this game from the spot, missed in the shootout when it was three-piece.
Riyad Mahrez, taking Leicester’s fifth spot-kick, had his effort pawed away by the flying save of Claudio Bravo.
What a remarkable night.
It was Cup football at its most dramatic, full of tension and drama after City appeared to have this in the bag when Bernardo Silva put them into a 26th minute lead.
Instead they were dragged level.
Pep was going spare on the touchline after City were made to pay for playing fast and loose, ragged around the edges football when the clock started ticking away.
It was a major mistake.
Kyle Walker made contact with Demarai Gray and the little Leicester forward went down with wind.
The pinch point for Jamie Vardy, thrown on as a 57th minute substitute with Riyad Mahrez to save the game, arrive from the spot.
He did not disappoint.
Vardy buried the chance, drilling his effort beyond Claudio Bravo with a brutal, powerful penalty.
Suddenly, it was shaping up to be one of this famous Leicester nights.
They dine out on them around here, with tales of their title triumph still filling the night sky.
It was a remarkable recovery, levelling from the spot after Bernardo Silva seemed to have taken City into the Carabao Cup semi-final.
Steady on, because Leicester had something to say about that.
Pep’s B team were a little ragged around the edges, a little short of the first team’s composure, but bloody good all the same.
The mistake they made in normal time was failing to put these Foxes away for good after Bernardo Silva put them ahead.
Ilkay Gundogan, slaloming his way through Leicester’s midfield to set up Silva for the opening goal, had been at his giddy best.
It helped that Claude Puel was so obliging, appearing to sacrifice an improbable chance to reach the semi-final by making so many changes.
Palace thrashed them 3-0 here on Saturday and yet their new head coach decided seven of them needed a rest.
The fans came to watch Jamie Vardy, Riyad Mahrez and Gray – Premier League winners 18 months ago – give this a right good go.
Instead they got Kelechi Iheanacho, Aleksandar Dragovic and Vicente Iborra.
Eventually these Foxes fans making a din in the stands got their way.
uel has gone back to playing the old Leicester way, relying on Shinji Okazaki to thread the ball through to some willing runner up front.
Here it was Iheanaho, the man who should have a point to prove after Pep flogged him to Leicester for £25m last summer.
Guardiola got it right, to be fair to him.
He did force a save out of Claudio Bravo, a decent one at that, just moments after he had been booked for clattering into his old City team-mate.
Beyond that, he did not have enough about him to really trouble old twinkle toes Eliaquim Mangala or young Tosin Adarabioyo in the centre of City’s defence.
His night was cut short after 56 miserable minutes, making the longest walk ever towards the touchline when he was replaced by Vardy.
He was not a happy bunny.
Vardy gave Leicester’s fans a lift, chiming for the striker to put the ball in the back of the net to force extra-time.
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He had some serious work to do.
City had punished Leicester with a goal in the first half, skilfully manufactured by Gundogan with a weaving run from midfield.
Yaya Toure bullied Iheanacho off the ball, set Gundogan free through the centre and Silva read his delightful, no-look pass on the right.
The finish was classy and composed, beating Ben Hamer with a nifty bit of footwork 26 minutes in.
By then City were on top, with Hamer forced to tip Gundogan’s delicious chip over the crossbar before the opener.
They are not quite the perfect side, because the perfect side would not allow Gabriel Jesus to leave his studs in Hamer’s thigh midway through the second half.
Referee Bobby Madeley, a man who looks like he has been indulging in one too many Christmas parties, eventually arrived on the scene.
Jesus, niggled that he did not get on the scoresheet, was booked.
So, too, was Gundogan when another slinking run took him goalbound before he was upended by Dragovic.
Gundogan does not seem the sort to go down with a little bit of wind, as Mourinho would say, but he was booked anyway.
With Riyad Mahrez on the pitch 12 minutes into the second half Leicester look more dangerous, forcing a save out of Bravo in a frenzied final five minutes. City, as City do these days, held on.
Walker was booked in extra-time, cautioned by Madley when he went down under Dragovic’s challenge.
In the end they had to settle for spot kicks.
Incredibly, City won it.
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