After a spellbinding episode of Six and the City, Kevin De Bruyne spotted Pep Guardiola’s coded message amid the torrent of superlatives.
In a week when his team have plundered 15 goals in three games without reply, Manchester City boss Guardiola claimed midfield star De Bruyne was one of the best players he had ever seen — high praise from the former high priest of Barcelona’s axis of Messi, Xavi and Iniesta.
But on the evidence of Saturday's irresistible performance and 6-0 win at Watford, Pep wasn’t kidding.
By common consent, new league leaders City were the best team to visit Vicarage Road in 30 years — since Liverpool were an unstoppable force of nature.
Six and the City? Sarah Jessica Parker can only dream of such entertainment.
Move over SJP, we’ve got KDB.
De Bruyne has absorbed Guardiola’s message and spotted the motivation behind it, saying: “It’s nice when somebody talks about you in that way. But maybe it’s also a way of putting a bit of pressure on me to keep producing the work I’ve been doing.”
Watford’s heaviest defeat in the top flight was exacerbated by hopeless officials, but City were fantastic.
After his sixth Premier League hat-trick – only Alan Shearer, Robbie Fowler, Michael Owen and Thierry Henry have scored more – Sergio Aguero isn’t just going to pass Eric Brook’s 78-year milestone as the Blues’ record scorer.
He is going to absolutely smash it.
Aguero is only two off Brook’s 177 now, and it would have been just one away if he hadn’t stepped aside to let Raheem Sterling complete the rout from the penalty spot.
And the return of midfielder Ilkay Gundogan, after nine months out with a knee injury, was the proverbial icing on the cake.
De Bruyne said: “Sergio’s record speaks for itself – it’s not just 30 or 40 goals, it’s 175, which is unbelievable at this level, and hopefully he won’t stop there.
“When the moment comes for him to break the record, it will be a nice achievement for him. And, of course, it’s a special moment for Ilkay to be back with the team after such a long time.
"He needs games, but when he regains his rhythm he will be a really good addition.
“It’s been a good week – 15 goals, three clean sheets and there’s not a lot for us to complain about.
“It’s been a long time since I had a week like this in football, and it shows the strength we have got, but we know there are going to be games which are tough and we will need more patience.”
Ominously for City’s title rivals, Guardiola believes there is even more potential to uncork from a squad costing £770million – of which, there was £200m of talent sat on the bench at Watford.
He said: “Today was like, ‘Oh no, we can’t improve!’ But of course we can improve. There is still movement, still actions, we can do better.
“We will see whether we are at Chelsea’s level when we face the last champions in a couple of weeks [City go to Stamford Bridge on September 30], but I think we have made a step forward in terms of last season.
“We won a lot of games away last season but we didn’t see that kind of performance.
“Now everybody knows what they have to do.”