Raheem

Sterling

One of England’s leading lights…

A Club record fee brought Raheem Sterling to City from Liverpool.

Regarded as one of the country’s most promising youngsters, he has fulfilled on his early potential to become one the Premier League’s most potent attacking players.

He is nine games shy of his 200^th appearance for the Club and his 69 goals and 65 assists have helped City win two Premier Leagues, three Carabao Cups, an FA Cup and the Community Shield.

Born in Jamaica, Sterling moved to London aged seven and spent seven years in the Queens Park Rangers youth set-up.

He moved to Liverpool in 2010 and made his debut against Wigan as a 17-year-old in March 2012.

His England debut against Ukraine in September that year saw him become Liverpool’s youngest international cap and he was a key member of the side that pushed City to the wire in the 2013/14 title race.

His performances earned him the 2014 Golden Boy trophy, awarded by sports journalists to Europe’s best U21 player.

Sterling played one more season on Merseyside before he opted for a fresh start at the Etihad Stadium in the summer of 2015.

He enjoyed a blistering first half of the 2015/16 campaign, scoring nine goals in his first 23 starts for the Blues, including a hat-trick against Bournemouth and two goals in two minutes against Borussia Monchengladbach on his 21st birthday.

He scored twice more in the months that remained, totting up an impressive 11 goals from 44 appearances, and made a stunning start to the 2016/17 season, winning the EA Sports Player of the Month and Etihad Player of the Month for September

His third season saw him score his best ever haul of goals - 23  - and play a vital role in City's title and Carabao Cup success, also winning him a nomination for PFA Young Player of the Year and he represented England at the 2018 World Cup.

Raheem scored the winning penalty in the Carabao Cup shootout win over Chelsea in 2019 and capped an incredible campaign with another Premier League title, the FA Cup and was voted the PFA Young Player of the Year and the Football Writers' Player of the Year, too.

If anything Sterling went from strength in the 2019/20 campaign.

He scored a career-best 31 goals in all competitions, taking him to 100 in total for the Club and chalked up 20 alone in the Premier League becoming our leading scorer for the season.

Raheem made 49 appearances during the 2020/21 season, scoring 14 goals.

He ended the campaign just eight games shy of 300 for the Club.

He also has been one of the stars of England's Euro 2020 campaign, scoring in three of the Three Lions'  first four matches.

Raheem was awarded an MBE by the Queen in her 2021 Birthday Honours List.