Promised Land all it’s cracked up to be IT will pain Bolton Wanderers fans to hear it, but the events of Sunday afternoon provided conclusive proof that the Premier League is the most exciting, most marketable product in world sport.

The 2011-2012 season had already been one of, if not the most enthralling in the Premiership’s 20-year history with Manchester City – runaway leaders and short-odds title favourites for so long – showing unbelievable quality and strength of character to overhaul United, despite trailing by eight points with just six games to play.

Okay, it turned into a two-horse race, but what a race. For weeks, the respective managers, Roberto Mancini and Sir Alex Ferguson, were suggesting it could go down to the wire, but by that they meant the final game.

Nobody – whether of the Blue or Red persuasion or the neutral outsider – expected it to go down to the final seconds.

What a spectacle. The greatest end to a title race in living memory – and a thoroughly deserved triumph for Mancini’s men.

I was captivated watching the events unfold live on Sky TV and just as spellbound seeing it all again on Match of the Day.

City were seemingly on course for a routine victory over QPR while down at the Britannia Stadium Wanderers were coming from behind to breathe fresh life into their survival mission. Then the whole thing was turned on its head at the Etihad, where we witnessed the most dramatic turn of events.

I shudder to think how high the Premier league’s stock has soared since Sunday.

No league in the world – including Italy’s Serie A, Germany’s Bundesliga and La Liga in Spain – can match its appeal. The quality may be higher elsewhere, but, for entertainment, European leagues don’t hold a candle to our Premiership.

Sadly, since they were unable to claim the win that would have ensured their survival on that fateful final day, Wanderers will not be part of it next season.

I hear some fans talking of life being more bearable in the Championship, where they expect Owen Coyle’s side to be challenging for an instant return to the top flight. Let’s hope so, but there are no guarantees.

There are parachute payments but there are no safety nets, while plenty of cautionary tales from history remind us there will be a host of clubs in England’s second tier who are equally determined to reach the promised land.

Sunday’s crimes will not be the last in Barton’s rap sheet

HE probably won’t mention it for fear of being accused of sour grapes, but I imagine Sir Alex Ferguson feels like spitting at the mention of Joey Barton’s name.

There is no knowing whether things would have turned out differently on Sunday afternoon if Barton had not got himself sent off at a pivotal point of the thriller at the Etihad Stadium.

QPR had thrown the proverbial cat among the pigeons by coming from behind to draw level with Manchester City and hand the advantage to Fergie’s United, who were 1-0 up at Sunderland.

Had Barton not elbowed his way to a red card, 10-man Rangers MIGHT not have hit City on the break for Jamie Mackie to head them in front; City MIGHT even have regained the lead and gone on to a comfortable victory. Who knows?

What I would suggest, however, is that had the energetic Barton been on the field in those closing stages and Mancini’s Blues had been 2-1 up against 11 men instead of a fast-tiring 10, Rangers’ previously resolute defence, in which keeper Paddy Kenny and centre-back Shaun Derry had looked unbeatable, might not have lost Edin Dzeko when he headed the equaliser after 91 minutes. And I can’t imagine Barton standing by and letting his team-mates capitulate so dramatically two minutes later in the move that led to Sergio Aguero’s winner. At that point Fergie was convinced United, victorious at the Stadium of Light, had claimed their 20th title. Such is life.

As he said so graciously, any team that wins the Premier League deserves it, and no one should begrudge City their success.

And lest you think I’m putting Barton on a pedestal and ignoring the obvious, think again.

For, while I am prepared to acknowledge his talents and his value to a team when he isn’t losing his head in the proverbial red mist, we saw football’s most notorious bad boy in all his glory on Sunday.

Once a violent hot-head, always a violent hot-head. We are talking leopards and spots here and no amount of apologising will change the public revulsion of this thug.

How else do you describe a footballer who, in such a crucial game for the club he captains, reacts to provocation by slamming his elbow in the throat of an opponent, then, after being justifiably sent off, attacks two more opposition players before having to be frogmarched off the pitch in the most shameful fashion?

Barton is a disgrace to his club, to his profession and, most of all, to himself. And how does he react to the subsequent furore? He complains that criticism of his behaviour – specifically by his former Newcastle boss and current Match of the Day pundit Alan Shearer – was “personal”. And he denied losing his head.

“The head was never gone at any stage,” he posted on his famous Twitter account. “Once I’d been sent off, one of our players suggested I should try to take 1 of theirs with me. Never worked but god loves a trier.”

This guy just can’t stop digging.

I don’t suppose QPR will do the decent thing and sack this deluded individual. And, since there is no mechanism in football for characters like him to be ostracised, I just hope the authorities hit him with a hefty suspension.

The FA’s decision to charge him with two counts of violent conduct on top of the automatic four-match ban he’ll serve for the red card, has led some to suggest he could be hit with a 10 to 15-match penalty. But that will not prevent him blowing a fuse in future and making him an obvious and understandable target for every wind-up merchant he comes up against.

These latest offences are unlikely to be the final entries on Barton’s already extensive rap sheet.

Roy’s first pick is spot on

I WAS against Roy Hodgson’s appointment from the start, but sincerely hope he succeeds as England’s manager.

So I was delighted to hear this week that he’s recruited Gary Neville to his backroom staff.

Being a Bury lad and a Red, Neville is not particularly well-liked in these parts, but credit where credit is due, he knows his football.

He showed that in his playing days with United and England and has shown since he retired from playing, with his punditry and analysis in print and on TV, that he is intelligent, adaptable and a good communicator.

Above all he knows footballers, knows dressing rooms inside out and would be a good fit in any top-flight coaching set-up.

Hodgson reckons his media work with Sky TV went some way to persuading him to get on board, but if he makes a go of it, Neville might be wasted in the media.

Talent is no proof of class

TRUST Carlos Tevez to rain on Manchester City’s parade.

Monday was meant to be a glorious celebration of the Blues’ first Premier League title, but club officials found themselves having to apologise to Manchester United after Tevez held up a banner that read “R.I.P. Fergie”.

Good player, no class.