Man City 4-1 Tottenham: Pep Guardiola hails rampant Blues for beating ‘one of the strongest teams in the Premier League’

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola believes his side hurdled a major obsticle by easing past Tottenham 4-1 at the Etihad Stadium.

The runaway Premier League leaders went 14 points clear at the top with their 16th consecutive league victory, which they sealed in fine style with goals from Ilkay Gundogan, Kevin De Bruyne and two from Raheem Sterling.

Ahead of the game many tipped Spurs to be the team to end City's incredible winning run, having last dropped points against Everton in August, but Mauricio Pochettino's men were ultimately humbled by the hosts.

And Guardiola hailed his side for dismantling 'one of the strongest teams in the Premier League’ in such a fashion.

"It was solid, it was good," said the Spaniard.

"Against a team demanding to be so intense without the ball because they play so good...they have good quality and they attack from behind with Harry Kane and Son (Heung-min) - but we played really good.

"We've beaten one of the strongest teams in the Premier League."

Tottenham star Dele Alli was perhaps fortunate to escape being sent off after coming down on the ankle of De Bruyne with a heavy challenge.

The England international, who also caught Gundogan in the first half, was shown only a yellow card.

De Bruyne seemed hurt, but the damage was not lasting as he burst into the area moments later and blasted a close-range shot through the grasp of Lloris to double City's lead.

Asked about Alli's challange, Guardiola said: "Hopefully he's strong (after the challenge), we were lucky. When it's just a kick, it's just a kick." 

De Bruyne was named man-of-the-match for another sparkling dislay, and he hailed his team-mates for an "incredible performance" against Spurs

"We know the quality of the team is very high," the City playmaker told BT Sport.

"Every game is a new game, we want to win every game and we're busy in the next couple of weeks and mentally we want to keep going and it was a great performance.

"We are pleased with the way we are playing at the moment."

Asked about their title chances after the win sent them 14 points clear at the top, he said: "We are here to win titles, we had a great start, (but) there's still more than half (of the season left). It's very hard, but I think the way we are going is very good.

"We want to win each game, like I said before, and we're doing a good job. Everybody who comes in, even Ilkay, who didn't play a lot, is doing an incredible job (and) we had an incredible game."