Nigel Pearson says Bristol City's showing in the defeat against Manchester City shows just how far his side have progressed in the last 12 months.
The Robins went toe-to-toe with Pep Guardiola's Premier League champions inside a raucous Ashton Gate and despite conceding inside the opening 10 minutes to Phil Foden, showed real character to keep themselves in the contest.
Mark Sykes will feel he could have had a penalty soon after the opener but City stuck to their guns by sticking with the 4-3-3 formation and hitting the visitors on the counter-attack when the opportunity allowed. Sam Bell was causing trouble on the left while Alex Scott was influential through the middle in breaking through the lines.
City weathered the storm at the beginning of the second half and almost had a dramatic equaliser in the 70th minute when half-time substitute Andi Weimann found Bell at the near post. The youngster agonisingly headed inches wide of the left post.
It's a game of fine margins and four minutes later, Man City had put the game to bed when Foden grabbed his second of the evening. Kevin De Bruyne, who was superb, added a third in the 81st minute when he brilliantly beat Max O'Leary to round off a 3-0 victory.
The scoreline perhaps flattered the visitors whose class came to the fore but Pearson said he was proud of the way his team stood up to the challenge. He said: "I'm proud of how the players approached the game, I'm really pleased that they're disappointed too. That's something that tells you where they are at.
"For somebody like myself not to be consoling them, but looking for positives in the dressing room and when you look at their faces they're visibly disappointed tonight and I think that tells you where we are now compared to where we were a year ago.
"I think it shows you how far we've come in the sense that we do have an identity now which is clear and that is we try and play at a good tempo, I didn't want us to sit off them and give them easy possession and we're at our best when we try and put teams under pressure.
"It doesn't mean that we had masses of possession ourselves but we held our own for large periods of the game, it's just that when you play against sides like that when you have opportunities you have to take them.
"Our half chances or opportunities came relatively early in the first half and weren't able to take them."
When asked about his thoughts on the penalty claim, Pearson responded: "Well, I joked with the fourth official that Premier League players are a protected species but I don't mean that. I'm being facetious.
"We went hundreds of days without a penalty and had two in a week so we can't be too greedy. On another day we might get it but I've seen it. Sometimes you get them sometimes you don't.
"It doesn't matter now. It's an event in the game that didn't go our way, we had other opportunities too and I just think we gave a good account of ourselves tonight."
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