Chelsea kept their title hopes alive with a huge 2-0 victory over Pep Guardiola's Manchester City on Saturday.

The Blues now sit on 34 points in fourth position and remain eight points behind new league-leaders Liverpool.

The win over the Citizens came after a rather disappointing 2-1 defeat to Wolverhampton Wanderers and provided a perfect response for Maurizio Sarri's men.

Defender Antonio Rudiger has revealed a potential reason why Chelsea reacted so well to the defeat to Wolves and it appears to be predominantly because of the manager.

The Blues boss was very animated in the post-match team talk according to the German international, suggesting the reaction was drilled into the players by the 59-year-old Italian.

“After the Wolves game, he (Sarri) was terrifying,” said Rudiger, per Evening Standard. “He was going crazy. But that was okay because we shouldn’t have lost this match.”

“The day after [the telling-off], [Sarri] was very calm and clear-minded,” added Rudiger.

“He spoke with us and made it clear that we have to believe in ourselves. He wanted us to go into the City game looking for the win.”

Sarri emphasised the importance of avoiding complacency and that Chelsea will suffer if form dips, using the Wolves defeat as the trigger, according to Rudiger.

“We spoke together, we all knew what was going on, we didn’t have to lie to ourselves: the mentality was the problem.

“One of the things that made us strong in difficult moments last season was that we knew how to suffer. This season, because things were going so good, we were thinking, ‘We don’t need to suffer’.

“Two teams, Tottenham and Wolves, proved us wrong. That’s why, against Manchester City, everyone saw a team that was ready to fight. We wanted to take the supporters with us and we did that."