Pep Guardiola justifies Man City tinkering as the Blues march on at Norwich

Pep Guardiola has an uncanny knack of making Manchester City fans nervous, even after five years of unprecedented success.

Blues fans repeat the mantra of “In Pep we trust” - but that often only lasts until the teamsheet drops.

And then the confidence and faith start to get a bit ragged around the edges, and a nervousness descends, a hangover from the old “typical City” days.

“He’s under-cooked the team”, “He’s left too many good players out”, “He needed his strongest team out,” goes the script.

But then, as at Norwich, the chosen XI shows that it has more than enough quality to win the game, and restore the 12-point gap to Liverpool ahead of their jolly Sunday afternoon outing to Burnley.

Raheem Sterling bagged a hat-trick and Phil Foden tapped in the other, as City fans gleefully taunted their city rivals with chants of "Mind the Gap, Man United!"

That gap is now 23 points, remarkable given that the Reds were touted as one of City's main contenders for the title back in the heady days of August.

The sight of Aymeric Laporte, John Stones, Rodri and Kevin De Bruyne on the bench for this one, while Fernandinho, Nathan Ake, llkay Gundogan and Aleks Zinchenko received the manager’s blessing, had more than a few having those moments of doubt and fear.

They should know better, as Raheem Sterling moved neatly into double figures for the season with a sweet opener, and Phil Foden scrambled a second as the Blues turned what was a decent slug-fest for the opening 25 minutes into the usual one-way decisive points win.

It stretched City’s unbeaten run in the league to 15, and teed them up nicely for Tuesday’s trip to play Sporting Lisbon - which neatly explains the fact that some of his prime stars were wrapped in cotton wool for