STERRED INTO ACTION

Raheem got back to doing what he loves ... testing defenders and laying on a goal for the brilliant Sane

THE haters might carry on hating, the racists might continue to abuse, but Raheem Sterling will just keep on doing what he loves.

Having a ball on the football field, feinting, dashing, beating men at will, assisting, serving his team, searching for goals.

This was not Sterling at his most spectacular, that was reserved for Leroy Sane.

This was Sterling doing the day job he relishes, testing defenders, creating openings.

This was Sterling wanting to be a headline-maker for his excellence not for being the verbal target of morons. For what he had to endure on Saturday and for his continuing defiance of stereotypical, racially-motivated criticism, Sterling has the sympathy and the support of every rightminded football fan.

But that should not make him immune from the sort of scrutiny that goes with the territory of an elite player.

There is no room for victimizing, but room for analysing.

Over the last few days, for example, the fearful slating he received in the wake of England’s abominable Euro 2016 – when he hash-tagged himself Thehatedone – has been held up as yet another example of him being treated unfairly, being grotesquely singled out.

And it is a prime example, make no mistake. No-one else in the squad was vilified quite like Sterling, not even Joe Hart.

Yet there is no airbrushing the fact Sterling had an extremely poor tournament, just as he had many frustrating spells in that three-year period without an England goal.

What is mightily impressive is how this young man has coped with the combination of fair and grossly unfair examinations over the course of his career. Not only coped but improved to become one of the most exciting talents in the world. That is why so much is expected of him every time he takes the field.

Sterling has become a City talisman but his early struggles in this game were symbolic of his team’s lethargy.

The only surprise was that it took a quarter of an hour for Aymeric Laporte to gift Hoffenheim the lead by wrestling Benjamin Hubner to the deck and enabling Andrej Kramaric to beat Ederson from P W D L F Apts