Pep Guardiola dismissed suggestions Liverpool had overdone the celebrations after his Manchester City side thrashed the newly-crowned champions 4-0 on Thursday.

City gave a reminder of their quality on what proved a sobering night for Liverpool, who were given a guard of honour by their hosts in their first match since securing the Premier League title last week.

Kevin De Bruyne began the rout with a penalty before further strikes from Raheem Sterling and Phil Foden and an Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain own goal.

“We had our moments where we were really close to making something but City were really there. They used our mistakes, we didn’t use their mistakes.

“The game was open but it clicked more for City than for us. I wanted to see a brilliant attitude and I saw that, the boys were really fighting.

“If there is a team in the world that can smash us like this it is probably City but we will come again.”

Klopp, who seemed irritable in some of his post-match interviews, also insisted last week’s celebrations had no impact on the result.

“It had nothing to do with last week,” he said in his post-match press conference.

“If anyone thought that the quality gap is 20 or 23 points I cannot help you. I saw pretty much all the City games and even in the games they lost they were good.”