Manchester City suffered a surprise defeat against Aston Villa to continue their poor form on the road. Here are five things we learned.

Short-termism problems

What a difference a week makes. City were world-beaters last week in the derby and fairly average against Aston Villa. The Blues haven't gone terrible overnight and should have come away with three points from the Midlands. Having said that, you need to average well over two points a game to win the Premier League and City aren't doing that - they have ten points from six games. Improvement is most definitely needed, especially when their games haven't been the hardest.

Priorities

Manuel Pellegrini still hasn't won away in the league as City manager, but that is less of a problem than the question of priorities. The Chilean made it clear before the game that Sergio Aguero and David Silva would not be risked for the Villa game; they may not be 100% fit but until the Blues win a league game before a Champions League clash questions will continue to be asked about whether the club has its priorities right in picking their big players for Europe over the Premier League.

Role reversals

The game was very strange for a number of reasons but one unusual aspect was the balance of play. Normally when a 'big' team plays a 'lesser' side quite often the David will play well but will be punished by the lethal Goliath who shows them what the Premier League is all about. City had all the play against Villa but were punished for being wasteful and not finishing their chances by Paul Lambert's side, who stole in and struck three times, catching City cold.

A fluky but not so fluky result

Vincent Kompany said after the game that City would win that same game nine times out of ten and he was probably right; it was a freak result. Having said that, we are talking about an Aston Villa side that beat Arsenal on the opening day, a result that was widely seen as the demise of Arsene Wenger's side at the time but must now be viewed differently in light of the Gunners' rise up the table.

Progress?

Stu Brennan's pre-match comment that Pellegrini was similar to Roberto Mancini in that it was difficult to guess his team selections caused a bit of a stir but taking that on more widely - how different is the team this season? The arrival of players like Jesus Navas definitely seems to have added something extra to the Blues and there have been some electric performances, but do the inconsistencies of this season seem strikingly familiar?