Last season, Manchester City smashed eight past Salford City in the third round of the FA Cup.

This time they went two better, beating Exeter City 10-1 at the Etihad Stadium to match the club’s biggest win (vs Huddersfield Town in 1987).

There were nine different scorers for City, including two debutant wingers (new signing Antoine Semenyo and 17-year-old Ryan McAidoo), as Pep Guardiola’s side ran riot. Semenyo scored one and set up another, while there were goals for young defender Max Alleyne, Rico Lewis (twice), Rodri, Tijjani Reijnders and Nico O’Reilly. Two Exeter City players scored own goals to help them out, too.

Late in the game, the visitors from England’s third division scored a consolation through George Birch.

Sam Lee analyses the key talking points from an easy afternoon for Guardiola’s side…

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Semenyo shines on City debut

It was only yesterday when Guardiola explained some of City’s thinking in the transfer market.

“I think modern wingers… before with wingers they were small guys, small players with (tight-space) ability, and today I think the future, you see with PSG for example or Madrid, or Barcelona with Lamine Yamal, I think the modern winger is like a (Leroy) Sane-type, tall, long legs, incredibly fast one-against-one, these type of players.”

And so in the starting line-up on Saturday, City had a perfect example of each — and both making their debut. On the right wing, Ryan McAidoo, a 17-year-old winger who is not quite like many City academy debutants these days — he was brought in from Chelsea two years ago, rather than brought through since the under-9s — but very much in the City mould of small, very tricky winger. Within minutes, he had produced a brilliant nutmeg to get himself out of trouble and he added City’s brilliant ninth at the end, before running to the crowd to hug family.

On the left flank, there was the new £62.5million signing Semenyo, very much representing the modern style that Guardiola described. With the City manager having suddenly shifted towards fast, physical units with devastating quality, the 26-year-old fits in perfectly. Although he rarely had an opportunity to hit full stride in the first half, with Exeter penned in, he carved out a lovely assist after a fine one-two and curling cross for Rico Lewis after the break.

Soon after, he raced away to score his first goal for his new club after a through ball from Rayan Cherki, allowing the new boy to stride forward and finish calmly.

(Mark Thompson/Getty Images)

Other than that, he was the target of several crossfield passes, offered runs in behind and still managed to rampage towards goal, just at a slower pace, taking on his man and usually sliding a pass to another runner. The first time he tried to shoot in such circumstances, it was blocked and fell to Rodri, who lashed it in.