Sterling can be record breaker
Maybe Southgate will realise that Sterling is more dangerous than Spurs striker Harry Kane Stuart Brennan
GARETH Southgate had clearly laid it on the line for Raheem Sterling.
He made it plain that, when he plays for England, chances are like Northern Rail trains – if you miss one, there won’t be another along for ages.
But when the 23-year-old plays for City, it’s the old London bus syndrome. Miss one and another will be along shortly. That is why Sterling had gone three years without a goal for his country, along with the fact that Southgate has been asking him to play a sacrificial role which placed the emphasis on Harry Kane as the focal point of the attack.
A tweak to a 4-3-3, the formation in which he has thrived for Pep Guardiola’s City in the last two years, threw off the shackles, and Sterling scored twice in the 3-2 win over Spain.
Maybe now Southgate will realise that if he HAS to build his attack around a focal point, Sterling is more dangerous than Spurs striker Kane.
The way he has been treated by sections of the media, you could not have blamed Sterling for telling the FA where they could shove their national team.
He is loved and appreciated at City, but had become a readymade scapegoat for any or all of England’s woes.
The ‘flash git’ persona manufactured by certain national media – and woefully wide of the mark once you meet and talk to him – has meant it was open season.
Sterling has had a love-hate relationship with goalscoring.
Guardiola admitted that getting into goalscoring positions had been ‘a bit scary for him’ in the past.
But last season, his impressive haul of 23 goals felt like a watershed moment.
In fact, the misses became so rare that his astonishing blooper at Burnley stands out in the memory – and caused Pep Guardiola to haul him off the field. That in itself is not a problem, especially when his goals had been winning games for City all season. The Turf Moor miss had become the exception that proves the rule. Now you wonder if those two goals against Spain – especially the first, at 0-0, against a man viewed by many as one of the world’s best goalkeepers – could actually complete the jigsaw in Sterling’s mind. Of course he will still miss them, for club and country, because everyone does. But his formidable mental strength is now applying itself to that final thorny issue, and the final barrier between Sterling and being truly world-class is coming down. At the age of 23, Sterling has four international goals, and 46 caps. No-one with any sense would back against him smashing an England record or two.