Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola says he will not “waste energy” on the EFL Cup, despite no manager having been more successful in the competition than him.

City reached this season’s last 16 thanks to first-half goals from Jeremy Doku and Matheus Nunes, his first for the club, in a 2-1 win over Championship club Watford.

Only Doku and Kyle Walker retained their starting places for a match that started less than 50 hours after the thrilling 2-2 Premier League draw against Arsenal.

With a league match being played in Newcastle on Saturday afternoon (12:30 BST) and a draw on Wednesday being called off by police as Manchester United play FC Twente at home in the Europa League, Guardiola opted to have the match resume quickly on Sunday rather than consider the alternatives of moving the match to Watford or playing it on Thursday.

“The next round, I’m announcing to you, I’ll play against the second team,” Guardiola said. “We’re certainly not going to waste energy.”

The fourth round is scheduled for October 29 or 30. Although there are no clashes with European matches that week, Chelsea will play in the UEFA Conference League when the quarter-finals are scheduled in the midweek before Christmas.

Guardiola is level with Brian Clough and Sir Alex Ferguson with four wins in this competition. However, with more European games this season, he feels he needs to look at the tournament differently.

“The schedule is the schedule, we can’t handle it,” he said. “Today for (James) McAtee, Matheus (Nunes), Jack (Grealish), Phil (Foden), who didn’t play, the young boy, 16 years old, it’s perfect,” he said. “That’s why it’s a good competition, otherwise we wouldn’t win four in a row.

“We play to go through. We never throw away a competition. Never. But we played 50 hours ago. I’m not going to take any risks with the Premier League and the Champions League in this competition.”