To be de facto premier league champions appear not to be enough as manager Pep Guardiola will like to go one step further by equalling and even surpassing Chelsea’s record of 95 points in a season, set in 2004/05.
This target, he believes, will serve to motivate his team to continue playing with the same verve, hunger and drive for the remaining five league fixtures starting with their home match against Swansea on Sunday.
Speaking during the week, Pep said: "In the past, I have won the league at Barcelona and Bayern Munich with five, six, seven games to go, and the remaining games were not good.
We tried to tell the players, ‘Come on, keep going’, but we were not able to keep going.
There has to be a target. When the target is already done in terms of the title, what is the reason to fight? Score as many goals, get as many wins and points as we can. That’s a good focus ".
Manchester City have 87 points from 33 games played in the league thus far.