Pep Guardiola conceded the title on Sunday night after locking his players in the dressing room for nearly an hour following their defeat at Tottenham.
The loss, courtesy of Steven Bergwijn's debut goal and Heung-min Son's strike after Manchester City were reduced to 10 men following Oleksandr Zinchenko's red card, leaves Guardiola's side 22 points adrift of leaders Liverpool.
And the Etihad boss has for the first time accepted defeat in their attempts to win a third consecutive title.
Guardiola initially nodded when asked if the title race was over before saying: 'They are far away so they are unstoppable. They have a lot of points, we have dropped points quite similar to today.
'Our targets are to win the remaining competitions and qualify for the Champions League next season.'
City were dominant before Zinchenko picked up a second yellow card to change the direction of the game.
Nevertheless, Guardiola kept his crestfallen players in the away dressing room for around 50 minutes after the loss as he held an instant inquest into the defeat.
'No, I was not angry. Normally I don't like it if we don't play good, if we don't run or we don't fight,' said Guardiola.
'Never when we lose do I stay away from my players because I know them. But we lost the game so we talked about how to move forward and keep going. There's a lot of months to play.'
Badshahking
515
22 points ahead πππ We want only big trophies Pep don't worry we will give you the small trophy fa cup and carling cupπππ
vaacilpuy
460
With d. Departure of Laporte due to injury makes Alot of difference to d team besides Kompanys retirement... Which was not MC way of being in dat position ya