It certainly worked.
Top of the league, 16 points from 18, 21 goals scored and only two conceded, things are looking pretty good for Manchester City as Pep Guardiola's men set the pace at the top of the Premier League along with their fierce Manchester rivals.
With Shakhtar Donetsk arriving at the Etihad Stadium, Guardiola will be hoping that his charges can continue their impressive goalscoring form against the Ukrainians but as we saw at the weekend, City were frustrated for the opening 40 minutes against Crystal Palace.
In fact, Ruben Loftus-Cheek could have given Hodgson's side the lead against the run of play.
During the first half, TV cameras picked up an exchange between Guardiola and ball boy.
After the footage was shown, plenty of people were wondering about what they were talking about.
https://twitter.com/Sammy_Goal/status/911600973210165249
As reported by the Spanish newspaper
SPORT, the Man City manager said: "'If you analyse 30 minutes in the first half, we were not ready to be there."
Guardiola added: 'Maybe over 90 minutes you cannot be there all the time. But it was slow. If there was a foul, no-one went to take the ball and start to play. There was five, ten seconds before someone goes to take the ball and start to play. When this happens everything is slow. So the ball boys were slow, everybody was slow. And we have to create in the game, to provoke the game. And we didn't for most of the time in the first half. In the second half, you could see immediately that the team was ready.
It's clear that Guardiola's words registered because after Leroy Sane scored, the floodgates absolutely pored opened with Sergio Aguero, Fabian Delph and a brace from Raheem Sterling wrapping up the 5-0 win.
If things are tight, plodding and slow between City and Shakhtar , at least you now know why Guardiola might be having a chat with the ball boy.
