Monday 15 January 2018 08:41, UK
Pep Guardiola led the plaudits for Liverpool after they ended his Manchester City side's 33-game domestic unbeaten run.
The runaway Premier League leaders suffered their first defeat on English soil since April 2017 as a scintillating second-half display from the Merseysiders inflicted a 4-3 defeat at Anfield.
"Congratulations to Liverpool. I have to give credit to the opponent," Guardiola told Sky Sports.
"We know how difficult Anfield is and how aggressive Jurgen Klopp's side are. We tried to make good build-up and found the spaces sometimes, but credit to Liverpool.
"It was a game they started well and, after we recovered, we equalised. In the second half we started much better and the game was in our hands. We had one or two chances but the finishing was not good.
"In the second half, they could not make two or three passes in a row, but in 10, 15 minutes, it went from 1-1 to 4-1, and after that it was a complicated recovery.
"In that moment we were not solid enough. But we continued, at the end we could have scored two goals, but nothing.
"You have to live this kind of situation during the season because in football you can lose one goal but you have to be stable."
Throughout City's imperious charge towards the Premier League title, Guardiola has maintained his side would lose at some stage.
And, having seen his prophecy come to fruition, the City boss claimed the challenge in front of his side was to bounce back from the setback.
"When every press conference in the last month said the Premier League is done, I always said, 'No it's not already done', because there are still a lot of difficult games to play," he added.
"You have to be focused on the next one and the next one. We did that until now, and in the end we were not able to win. We are going to defend our position game by game.
"The reality is that we lost the game, and now we have one week to recover and prepare for Newcastle."
