EPL: Man City deliver statement of intent with Liverpool win

If Manchester City wanted to send an ominous message that it will take something special to remove their status as Premier League champions, Sergio Aguero took 23 seconds to deliver it.

City – without needing to be anywhere near their best against the team that took the title race to its final day last season – were already cruising with a two-goal lead when Aguero made his 69th-minute entrance as a substitute for the limping Edin Dzeko.

In the space of those few seconds the Argentina forward strolled onto the pitch at Etihad Stadium and right onto the end of Jesus Navas’s perfect pass to put the home side out of sight of Liverpool and maintain their 100% start to the season.

It was a symbolic, highly impressive demonstration of the power City manager Manuel Pellegrini has at his disposal, made even more emphatic as it was produced against a Liverpool side that had the title in their grasp in late April only to stumble near the finishing line.

Watching it all, impassively for the most part, was the man who has been consigned to City’s past but who is now entrusted with ensuring Liverpool have a bright future after the departure to Barcelona of last season’s 31-goal top scorer Luis Suarez.

Mario Balotelli’s face was cheered when it appeared on the big screens as he remains a popular figure with City’s supporters, but just hours after the 24-year-old was officially confirmed as a Liverpool player he had the size of the task awaiting him laid out by his former employers.