For large spells Chelsea dominated the champions, reflected by the fact we had more possession than our opponents. N’Golo Kante put us ahead after we had already had a couple of great chances, but Man City fought back with two quickfire goals and eventually emerged victorious.

Despite the outcome, Lampard praised his team’s showing against top opposition, finding lessons to be learned and reasons for optimism...

‘Coming into the game, our recent form and how we’re developing quickly, I wanted to come here and be brave, to compete, to be brave on and off the ball,’ said Lampard.

‘In the first half you saw all of that from us. At 1-0 we have relative control of the game. We didn’t have that little bit of quality in the final third. They had a couple of moments but we were playing well. Throughout the game there were a lot of positives, but we lost and it shows you at this level the finer details in both boxes are what decide these ones.’

Our last league defeat was against the leaders Liverpool in September

‘Everyone seems fixated on these couple of games we have played. We went toe to toe with Liverpool in Istanbul and lost on penalties. We lost at home to them in the league pushing for 45 minutes, and we have lost today with a very good performance.

‘It’s moments in the boxes. That can be why you win it or why you don’t. These teams, Liverpool and City, have been getting results for a long time because they work together, they work hard, and those finer details they maybe get right.

‘Today I don’t think you come away from the game and say anything other than there were two really strong teams going against each other. One wins it because of a deflected goal, and then a real moment of quality from Mahrez. The rest was pretty much in the balance.’

Lampard considered if we are getting nearer to Liverpool and Man City

‘We’re coming, that’s what I thought, we’re coming to close the gap. I don’t want to shout that too loudly because football is day to day, week to week, and we will have to show a response after a great run of wins.

‘It feels like a long time since we lost in the league and we have to get back on it straightaway.’