Huddersfield Town received praise for their defending against Premier League leaders Manchester City on Match of the Day 2 tonight despite losing to the Citizens.

Kevin Kilbane and Martin Keown joined Mark Chapman in the studio to assess the performance and both praised Town's defending against Pep Guardiola's juggernaut - although the former Arsenal man wanted to see more of them going forward.

After Chapman teed up the segment on Town, Keown said: "Huddersfield did [defend well].

"But the running that they had to do to get into position was quite remarkable.

"I thought they were quite clever the way they did it - basically they played with a back five, and [Rajiv] Van La Parra just dropped in there to try to deal with Sterling and Walker's runs.

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"And then they had that four in the midfield.

"They all knew their roles and responsibilities.

"Everyone was engaging, every time they needed to mop up they were tight from the back and they had a good balance.

"Basically they camped on the edge of their box and they were nice and compact.

"City didn't move the ball anywhere near as well as they normally do and they took advantage of that and everyone was up in the faces of the opposition.

"But I think it was tricky really because they just played with the one striker and it was difficult for [David] Silva and [Kevin] De Bruyne.

"In the second half it was exactly the same story.

"Every player knew who they had to engage with, it was really well worked out by the manager - it would have been worked on the training pitch.

"And City were relentless in their pursuit and Guardiola made that change with [Gabriel] Jesus coming.

"Suddenly you now have two strikers and they are pinning those central defenders back.

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"De Bruyne gets into that little pocket - he's so clever and knows where to be.

"Of course it's [Raheem] Sterling who makes the difference and runs with the ball, but the central defenders now can't come out and they just over-covered in midfield.

"De Bruyne just lends it really and Jesus is on to it [ahead of the second goal]."

Former Town defender Kilbane added: "It's distances they [Town] got right all over the pitch.

"With that five at the back it was almost like 6-4 with the outfield.

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"When they were back in that shape, the distances were all eight to 10 yards - eight to 10 yards in front of you and eight to 10 yards to the side.

"It's very, very difficult for the likes of Silva and De Bruyne to get into the game."

Finally, Keown summarised: "It's a huge challenge when you play against City and you think of the likes of De Bruyne and Silva - they are the artists, the paintbrushes of this team.

"If you shut that space down and stop them from playing you have half a chance, but they - Huddersfield - didn't manage a single shot on goal today.

"There was nothing from them going forward and they'll be concerned with that."