Pep Guardiola insists Manchester City’s place in their third straight League Cup final was deserved despite their 1-0 semi-final second-leg defeat by Manchester United.

Nemanja Matic scored the only goal of the game for the visitors before being sent off as United rode an early storm and came close to forcing a penalty shootout.

Guardiola told Sky Sports: ‘We played really well and over 180 minutes we were better than United.

‘We are happy to go to Wembley for our third final in a row, and we will fight for the competition like we fought three years ago.

‘We conceded a goal in the only time in the first half they had a shot on target, and in the second half we created enough chances to score a lot of goals.

‘We didn’t convert them and, of course, have to learn from that and we have to be more clinical.’

United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer slammed Matic’s second-half sending-off for two bookable offences, branding the decision ‘a joke’.

Solskjaer added: ‘It’s ironic because he got a yellow card for the first foul and the second one was nowhere near.

‘It shouldn’t be like this because I’m proud of the players. We’ve come so far with these boys and they’re giving us absolutely everything.

‘Even though we didn’t create too many chances we pressed them back and we had spells when they were defending deep.’