Jose Mourinho holds key to Chelsea overcoming Pep Guardiola's Premier League ominous warning

Thomas Tuchel was en route to Abu Dhabi and mentally preparing for the FIFA Club World Cup final when Pep Guardiola sat down to face the media ahead of Man City's trip to Norwich City.

Guardiola's press conference was fairly run-of-the-mill: he answered questions about the Canaries' improvement under Dean Smith, Jack Grealish, Riyad Mahrez, and delivered an injury update. Yet one question focused around Liverpool did give telling insight into the mind of the Catalan.

“I was born in Barcelona and their academy taught me everything. The best way, even there, is to think everything can go wrong," Guardiola said about the Premier League title race, which City currently lead by six points.

“We made an incredible run in the Premier League so far and Liverpool is still there around the corner. That shows how amazing and difficult our opponent is.

“There’s no doubt about that. The margin against Liverpool is nothing. We have to win a lot – more than 90 points – 95, 96 to be champions."

There are two big takeaways from those comments. The first is that Guardiola doesn't consider Chelsea a threat to City's Premier League crown this season. Given the Blues are 16 points behind the reigning champions – albeit they do have a game in hand – is more than fair.

The second is the City head coach believes the relentless, almost-merciless approach needed to win the Premier League remains, that dropped points are not so much a cause for frustration but are a complete aberration.

City and Liverpool have set the standards over the last four years. In that period, the former has averaged 91 points a Premier league season while Jurgen Klopp's side have averaged 85. By contrast, Chelsea have averaged just 69 in the top flight. It's this gap