Pep Guardiola claimed he did not feel any different after Manchester City’s 8-0 win over Watford than after their loss to Norwich.
City achieved their biggest ever win of the Premier League era on a record-breaking afternoon, which saw Bernardo Silva score his first top-flight hat-trick and Sergio Aguero reach 100 goals at the Etihad Stadium.
A notorious pursuer of perfection, Guardiola was modest enough to describe the performance as no different to the one that saw them beaten 3-2 by Norwich last week – believing the quality of his squad made the difference against Watford.
Guardiola told BBC Sport: “When you shoot on target five times for five goals – the quality of players we had made the difference. In the first minutes we gave them two chances to score two goals and they didn’t.
“What I like the most is normally when it’s 5-0 at half time the second half is not serious, it’s boring but we did the opposite and we were more aggressive and made a very good second half.
“People still don’t understand, journalists, pundits, former players, losing games is part of life. Opponents always deserve respect. The same feeling I have now I had after Norwich so it was not a bad performance. We can lose the games but the important thing is the approach and how we react.
“We are one of the best teams in statistics for having the least shots on target against us. We improved as we could have conceded two but we know the men up front we have have a huge amount of talent.
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“Do you think after what these guys have done for two seasons they have to prove something?
“We listened after Norwich but people don’t understand that we can lose games. Sometimes I am surprised former players and pundits still don’t understand that. We have to prove for ourselves that there is desire to win and go to the latter stages of the season and try and win the titles.
“Bernardo was the best player last season. He was extraordinary. I think he doesn’t need to score three to get the credit he deserves but it’s important for the team that many players score.”