Paddy Davitt delivered his Man City verdict after Norwich City's 4-0 Premier League defeat.

1. Pick your battles

So there was no repeat of that previous Carrow Road win over Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City. Which only served to underline perhaps what a generational result that was for those Canaries back in September 2019. A victory which at the time reverberated around the world.

Fair to state, on the basis this sky blue vintage moved a remarkable 12 points clear of nearest challengers Liverpool, ahead of the Reds next game at Burnley on Sunday, Dean Smith’s side also encountered what looks increasingly like the best squad to grace the Premier League in modern times.

No disgrace then for the Canaries’ own nascent revival to be halted at the altar of Guardiola’s total football.

Smith insisted it was ‘11 humans against 11 humans’ in the build up but the gulf was evident long before Raheem Sterling’s opener. After Phil Foden added a second, before some home fans may have returned to their seats after the break, it became a training session.

The Norwich boss also said this game would not define his club’s season. In that he is right. Once they sidestep a league and a cup tussle with Liverpool on the horizon they face Southampton, Brentford and Leeds. Certainly in the case of the latter two, teams who can conceivably be dragged into the argument at the bottom.

Those are the games that go a long way to deciding Norwich’s top flight fate. Not a brush with the champions-elect.

2. Not the first, nor the last

The genius of this Guardiola Manchester City dynasty is not the quality they possess. That is a given when they can reasonably afford to buy any player in the world.

It is the relentless, remorseless manner they have turned the Premier League title race into a procession this season. If it was possible for Guardiola to raise the bar his side look on course to clear it with considerable ease if they maintain what looks an inevitable journey to another coronation.

In Smith’s Norwich City they found honest, hard working opponents desperate to close down, to harry and to frustrate. They managed it for the majority of the opening period. Bar Sterling’s opener. But there was always a crushing inevitability to the final outcome.

They keep playing, they keep believing in the principles instilled by Guardiola, they wear teams down with slick movement, rotation in wide areas and a speed of thought and deed.

You had to feel for those Canaries trying to lay a glove on the visitors at times. It must be a sickening sensation to share a pitch and feel no matter what you are able to muster they have an answer.

Especially when Angus Gunn guessed correctly to stop Sterling’s late penalty, only for the ball to rebound fortuitously to the attacker to slot into an empty net. Like Guardiola’s side need any luck.

Smith said there could be no such thing as a free hit but what he did not say is there is a small seam of elite teams who can appear untouchable, if they approach the task in the right manner. Alas, Norwich face another one when they travel to Liverpool next weekend.

3. Fine margins

If only. If only Grant Hanley’s towering header had thumped the base of Ederson’s left hand post and bounced inside his goal, with the sides goalless. For Norwich to take the lead would have lit the touchpaper.

Then again, Bernardo Silva’s earlier clip had struck Gunn’s post and rebounded into his arms. Perhaps a more telling comparative was the minute between hat-trick man Sterling’s breakthrough and a major sight of goal for Kenny McLean.

The England international appeared to sense the error from Max Aarons in the manner he was on the move and killed the ball with his first touch, then shifted Aarons off-balance with a shimmy and curled a perfect finish just inside Gunn’s left-hand upright.

But Teemu Pukki’s energetic burst, almost immediately from the restart, saw the ball invitingly reach the unmarked McLean, who choked his left footer attempt from 18 yards. That is not to highlight the Scot’s lack of composure at a crucial moment but in truth underline the chasm between these two squads in those key, clinical fragments.

But that is to state the obvious if you look at the galaxy of talent on the pitch for Guardiola, and the riches on the sidelines in unused substitute Kevin De Bruyne, or absent entirely in £100m man Jack Grealish.

The same league but a different football planet.

4. Nominate Normann

Another 30 minute or so second half cameo for Mathias Normann was a pleasing sight in the bigger picture. Smith had hinted on Friday he felt the Norwegian international was not yet back to the physical levels required for this type of test.

Perhaps also at the back of his mind was getting Normann in tip top shape for those massive league tests ahead, against teams in the bottom half of the Premier League.

Normann had shown enough prior to his lengthy spell out, which finally ended in surgery to overcome the pelvic-related issues that had hampered him, to suggest he has a key role in what is to come.

Norwich desperately need his drive, his energy, his talismanic influence and above all his quality on the ball. Mercifully they will not have to handle midfielders of Manchester City’s class every week from here.

The bigger question now is not if Normann starts, but who Smith opts to deploy alongside him in those central areas.

McLean shovelled a prodigious amount of work but in a three with Billy Gilmour and Pierre Lees-Melou the questions persist whether that trio possess all the attributes needed with and without the ball.

5. Idah injury concern

The absence of the Republic of Ireland international striker with what Smith called afterwards 'knee and ankle soreness' that requires further assessment robbed the Canaries' boss of the opportunity to put another attacking chip on the table.

In all probability it would have made little difference in this game, or possibly that upcoming trip to Anfield, but Idah had shown in those wins over Everton and Watford particularly he can have a say and provide some genuine attacking thrust.

Not to mention ease the burden on main man Pukki.

It may be an anxious wait to assess the extent of Idah’s issue suffered in the previous 1-1 draw against Crystal Palace.

Certainly it would prompt a re-think for Smith if he is without the forward for any length of time, given his preference against the lesser lights to harness Idah and Pukki in a four-pronged attack.

That wretched festive spell of five straight league defeats, without scoring, was in large part a by-product of a debilitating injury list and illness-related absences.

With Tim Krul, Jacob Sorensen, Andrew Omobamidele and Ozan Kabak all ruled out of this latest offering, that is not a trend Smith, or the Canaries, can afford to re-visit again.