Manchester City’s biggest names certainly seem to save their most interesting quotes for niche live streams.
Their Zoom lockdown quizzes must have been a hoot.
A little over a month on from Pep Guardiola regaling the good people at XP Investimentos over his future plans, Raheem Sterling told the FT Business of Sport US summit he is open to a move away from the Etihad Stadium.
“If there was the option to go somewhere else for more game time I would be open to it,” he said.
“As an English player all I know is the Premier League and I’ve always thought, ‘You know, maybe one day I’d love to play abroad and see how I would come up against that challenge’.”
Sterling expressing an interest in plying his trade beyond these shores is nothing new. Before a 2020 Champions League tie against Real Madrid, he did an interview with AS and posed with both City and Madrid shirts.
In 2019, he told GQ : “It’s always been a dream of mine to play abroad somewhere."
Sterling had not long been named FWA Footballer of the Year after inspiring City to an unprecedented domestic treble.
That interview was conducted with Alastair Campbell, the infamous New Labour spin doctor. Notwithstanding his vast experience in the dark arts, even Campbell would have a job painting Sterling’s 2021 club form in a positive light.
City hit by Sterling crash
Since scoring the winner in a 1-0 victory over Arsenal at Emirates Stadium at the end of February, the 26-year-old has played 26 games for City in all competitions, starting 16. In this period he has two goals and three assists.
As the barren weeks stack up, Sterling’s phenomenal Euro 2020 form - where he scored three goals in England’s first four matches before turning in arguably even better displays against Ukraine and Denmark in the quarter and semi-finals - becomes more of a curious outlier.
Talking about wanting a move abroad when you are a key player in the Premier League's best team is one thing; doing it when you’re struggling for form and the big beasts on the continent lack the finances to realistically make a move happen is another.
A number of factors have narrowed Sterling’s prospects as he stands at a career crossroads. This makes another section of the FT interview more relevant as the ex-Liverpool man prepares for a probable start at centre-forward against Burnley on Saturday - a team City have beaten 5-0 on each of their past four visits to the Etihad Stadium in all competitions.
“To give me an edge, if there is a big game coming up, I probably [use] a little bit of criticism then try and spin it,” he said. “It’s one of my best traits – I mean [having] a challenge.
“Not necessarily something negative said but maybe somebody saying: ‘He’s not scored in a few games now’, and I’ve got one coming up. Something like that.”
Resilient, relentless Raheem
Sterling’s career to date bears this out. Raheem absolutely loves a bit of needle. Just ask Joe Gomez.
To summon his Euro 2020 form amid the most difficult period of his City career under Guardiola showed immense fortitude. His levels of motivation in recent Anfield performances, most notably when scoring in last season’s 4-1 win, have been terrifyingly ravenous.
Then there is the vulgar adversity that no one should ever suffer, to which Sterling has also responded to emphatically.
When he was racially abused and assaulted at City’s training ground in December 2017 by a man who was given jail time for the offence, the forward scored twice in a victory over Tottenham later that day.
After being abused at Stamford Bridge in 2018, Sterling did not only change the UK sport media’s conversation around race fundamentally with his eloquent take on the subject, he scored twice against Chelsea in a 6-0 win later that season before netting the decisive penalty against the same opponents in the Carabao Cup final.
During last season’s cup tie against Burnley at Turf Moor, opposition manager Sean Dyche lambasted Sterling, telling him, 'you spend half your f****** life on the floor, son’ after a late tackle that saw the City favourite booked.
Raheem had already scored twice that night. He would surely relish doing so again this weekend, with Ferran Torres’ injury granting him a timely opportunity to turn things around.
Sterling’s dip in form at City has been as prolonged as it is surprising. But rest assured, this most hard-nosed and resilient of footballers will not give up on his future in Manchester without a fight.
The most challenging weeks of his City career lie in wait. As he says, he wouldn’t have it any other way.
Do you want Sterling to stay at City? Follow our City Is Ours editor Dom Farrell on Twitter and let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
