Afterwards, Guardiola made a point of praising his players rather than criticising their lack of control. “They are supermen,” he said. “Honestly, I am telling you. Our fans have to be so proud of these guys. Bournemouth had seven days to prepare, seven days of dreaming of beating the best team in the world.”

This has been a strange campaign for Bournemouth, who went seven games unbeaten before the turn of the year but are now another seven matches without a victory. Their form seems to fluctuate over the course of a yawning period of months, rather than weeks.

One aspect of Andoni Iraola’s team that is consistent, though, is their willingness to press high up the pitch without the ball. Unlike so many of City’s opponents, Bournemouth were aggressive with their positioning, on the front-foot from the first minute and attempting to force errors.

The problem with such an approach is that it requires perfection against a team of City’s quality. One mistimed jump, or one moment of hesitation, is usually all that Guardiola’s players need to score a goal.

In this case, City actually required two of those defensive deficiencies to take the lead. For the first, Erling Haaland fired wide of goal after surging onto Foden’s glorious volleyed pass. These are oddly wasteful times for Haaland.

Despite that early opportunity, Bournemouth were largely playing well in the opening exchanges. But there was still a sense of inevitability to it all when Foden struck after 24 minutes, tapping into an empty net after Neto, the Bournemouth goalkeeper, had blocked Haaland’s shot.