Tottenham bully Manchester City in 2-0 road victory: Why alarms should be going off for Pep Guardiola's team

Defeat at the hands of Tottenham might be a familiar setback for Manchester City, but of all the many surprise losses to Tottenham, this one feels significant. Pep Guardiola has been sucker-punched by Spurs before, he has seen his team blown away in the decisive moments, but he has rarely, if ever, seen City held so comfortably at arms' length by their bogey team.

First half goals from Brennan Johnson and Joao Palhinha gave Tottenham plenty to defend, Thomas Frank's side attacking the occasion in a fashion that bore all the hallmarks of their manager. Spurs were aggressive in pressing and brilliantly organised. They did not need a lot of the ball to do plenty of damage, their goals coming through the precise punishment of City's weaknesses. John Stones was a half a step behind a high line and Richarlison was away in behind to tee up the opener for Brennan Johnson. The next saw the pressure of Richarlison and Pape Matar Sarr force a skittish James Trafford to give away possession in his box, Palhinha smashing home to double the lead.

For the sixth time in his time managing in the Premier League, Guardiola returned to the dressing room at half time tasked with puzzling out how City could overturn a two-plus goal deficit in the second half. Three of those have come against Spurs, but for all that this particular opponent seems to bring the worst out of the Mancunians, City have overturned such deficits in recent memory. And yet, there was never an instance where it seemed like parity might be restored.

That is where the real worries lie for Guardiola. With and without the ball, his team were unable to control proceedings. Tottenham big brother-ed them. Cristian Romero, Micky van de Ven and the midfield pivot that protected them kept City at arms' length, challenging them to lob balls into the box in pursuit of Erling Haaland. There had been a decent opening before Spurs' opener when the City striker dropped deep and slipped Omar Marmoush in behind. In the second half there was barely even a sniff for the hosts, outshot five to eight when they should have been raining down efforts on goal. Only two openings even asked questions of the Spurs defense, Palhinha blocking one and Phil Foden finding a half-chance late on.

Without Rodri, held in reserve until the 75th minute as he steps up his recovery from the injury he suffered at the Club World Cup, there was no one in City blue to compress the game into the Tottenham third. Mohamed Kudus and Johnson did yeoman's work for Spurs chasing the ball down the flanks, but they never had to wait long for an opening to stretch their legs into clear green space at the Etihad. Tijjani Reijnders might have excelled as a second striker against Tottenham, but his presence next to Rayan Cherki as the advanced midfielders left Nico Gonzalez overwhelmed when possession was lost.

City lacked a shield against the counter and a tempo setter in their build up. They could not manufacture openings for Haaland, who went almost 40 minutes without a penalty box touch and ended the match with only one shot, a high-difficulty header off a Cherki cross.

Guardiola's attempts to play a more direct style had found success last week against Wolves, but against an opponent capable of discomforting them in their own third -- Trafford looking particularly shaky throughout and only got worse after handing Spurs their second -- they looked less like a team than they had done even in last season's sustained downturn. This was a collection of pods crying out for someone to link them together.

Tottenham refused them that opportunity. Frank has swiftly incubated a team that bears plenty of the hallmarks of his best Brentford teams, just executed by even more talented players. Sarr looks ideally suited to an advanced disruptor role that will suit this team well against other big name opponents, while Richarlison seems to have rediscovered the fighting spirit that looked to have slipped away after his summer of many tournaments. Spurs could defend their own box comfortably but they wanted to make City work to get there.

"After the 1-0 goal we were more or less the better side," said Frank. "The high pressure was consistently good second half and they struggled to get out of it."

Play like this again and Tottenham will give bloody noses to a few other title contenders, and for the time being City deserve to retain that status. Rodri's return is not far off and, after all, plenty of great Guardiola teams have come undone against Tottenham. Few, however, have been beaten as thoroughly as this one.