📸: standard.co.uk

A landslide victory it was for Manchester City when they hosted Leeds United on Tuesday night as they hit seven goals without reply past Marcelo Bielsa's side.

Baring in mind that they lost this same fixture last season 1-2, when Leeds scored with the only two shots they had on target, it looks like City were still wounded from that loss and were set to rip their visitors apart.

In a very rare situation that saw six different goal scorers for the defending champions, Phil Foden opened the scoring, followed by goals from Jack Grealish, a brace from Kevin De Bruyne, Riyad Mahrez, John Stones and Nathan Ake.

Missing Joao Cancelo, who was serving his one match ban after receiving his fifth yellow card of the season, Guardiola adjusted his team to play in what looked like a three-man defence, with John Stones coming in for the absent Portuguese defence.

Marcelo Bielsa was most likely still sulking from that bitter loss in the hands of Chelsea last time out, but stuck with the same team.

Foden was the first to test Ilan Meslier as early as the 5th minute with a low shot that the French goalkeeper had to go down quickly to save, before Bernando Silva in a rare sight about two minutes later missed from five yards out after City had hit on a counter.

A minute later, Foden would make amends for his earlier miss when he tapped into an unguarded net after Rodri Hernandez had wriggled his way past many obstacles to be through on goal, before Meslier knocked the ball away from him, but only as far as Foden at the edge of the box to open the floodgates.

It would not be long for hosts to double their lead as they did so five minutes later. Leeds United fail to deal with a City corner, which was gathered and sent back in by Mahrez towards an unmarked Jack Grealish, who headed home from close range.

With the way City started with two early goals, one would have wondered that it was going to rain goals, but they had to wait till the 32nd minute before getting their third and last in the first half.

Foden released the ball to Rodri, who matched the run of De Bruyne with a first time ball and the Belgian showed no mercy as he struck low an angled shot beyond Meslier.

The rain of goals would resume four minutes after the break when Mahrez received the ball from Ilkay Gundogan at the edge of the box and drilled home an effort from about 20 yards out that deflected off Junior Firpo.

The visitors went closest to pulling one back minutes later when a poor clearance from Oleksandr Zincheko found its way to Stuart Dallas at the edge of the box, but his effort came off the outside of the post.

De Bruyne got his brace in the 72nd minute with another flash of a screamer from 25 yards out. He turned after receiving the ball from Gundogan and sent his wicked effort past Meslier into the roof of the net.

Then two quick fire goals from set pieces in the last 15 minutes ended the marauding outing by the Champions. Stones scored on his second attempt after Aymeric Laporte headed against the goalkeeper from De Bruyne's corner. Shortly after, Nathan Ake rose highest to head home an out-swinging corner from Foden to end Leeds's misery.

Concluding Thoughts

Even though on paper it was going to be a Manchester City win, not many would have predicted a seven-goal haul, especially given the potential that Leeds United possess.

By a wide margin, Manchester City along with Liverpool are the most consistent teams in the country and they have once again shown why they are champions.

Over 500 goals in just 207 matches under Guardiola shows how much firepower they posses, even when playing without a recognized striker. They can only be stopped by themselves this season.

Marcelo Bielsa may want to re-watch the match to see where they got it all wrong. Conceding seven goals for the first time in his over 500 managerial games, he must be taken aback, but that sums up how poorly Leeds have been this season. They need to find a solution quickly, else, they might just be going down.