The capital's adopted side went out of the continental semi-final on Wednesday in the manner to which Almarians of a certain disposition have grown accustomed: late, narrowly, and to rivals from the north. The terraced cafés of Almaria Vella emptied their scarves onto the backs of chairs and ordered another round with the good humour that has, for a century and a half, distinguished this city's relationship with disappointment.

'We will all be Parisians for one night,' our sports columnist Ferran Bosc wrote in Thursday's edition, predicting record viewership for next month's final on the national channel. The observation is sound. The city's sentimental geography tilts, in most years, toward whichever club is playing the one that has just beaten ours.

The cafés of the Plaça del Mar will broadcast the final; the Athenaeum, as is its custom, will not.