The PR work has already started with his agent. Sources letting the Telegraph know that the Liverpool fans behaviour is the source of his meltdown. The media just lapping it all up.
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Why years of vilification after Anfield exit may be at root of Raheem Sterling meltdownIt was a huge game for Manchester City at Anfield on Sunday, a chance to halve Liverpool’s six-point lead over the visitors and put down a marker while slowing their rivals’ formidable march.
It was no less so for Raheem Sterling and, as the fallout from his bust-up with Joe Gomez is hungrily dissected, that loss of control for which the City forward has subsequently apologised appears to have its roots in a lot more than just frustration at a particularly damaging defeat.
Liverpool is not just any game for Sterling. His departure from Anfield in 2015 was one of the most acrimonious of the Premier League era and he has been feverishly targeted with boos and chants of “there’s only one greedy b------” whenever he returns to the club he once called home.
There has certainly been a feeling among those close to him that so much of the vilification and vitriol he received in the media was borne, in part, by what he felt were Liverpool’s attempts to paint him as the villain of the piece during and after his £49 million transfer to City.
Sterling quickly became typecast as a bad-boy mercenary who had moved primarily for a £180,000-a-week salary worth double what was on offer at Anfield, even if his now bulging trophy cabinet dictates otherwise, and, whether a seed was sown or not, a wave of vacuous “stories” with an uncomfortable undertone would follow in certain outlets.
Remember the one about him buying a sausage roll from Greggs and having the temerity to eat it in a “£500,000 limited edition Bentley”? Or that one about him shopping in Poundworld, as if that was some sort of mortal sin for such a wealthy individual? And so the list goes on.
He would later joke that he had one of those faces “people don’t like” but the watershed moment came after he was abused during City’s 2-0 defeat at Chelsea in December last year and responded in an Instagram post by accusing some sections of the media of helping to “fuel racism” through their portrayal of young black footballers.
This, of course, is not to excuse Sterling’s behaviour towards Gomez but it might help to offer some context to why the City forward reacted so disproportionately the day after his shove from the Liverpool defender in the closing minutes of Sunday’s 3-1 defeat.
One source on Tuesday suggested the Liverpool game had become “totally acidic” for Sterling and perhaps his second clash with Gomez, at St George’s Park after reporting for England duty, was an unacceptable unloading of years of pent-up frustration whenever he visits Anfield.Sterling had actually been quite calm in the dressing room after the game and had appeared to patch things up with Gomez but something snapped in him on Monday. It is worth noting that Sterling has never suggested he is a saint, even if the narrative has swung so wildly now that people seem wary of even legitimate, constructive criticism. He just asked for some fairness and balance.
Equally, no player rises to the very top without having some bite and fight. Any of the kids at Rainhill High School, where Sterling was sent after joining Liverpool in 2012, will tell you this was a lad who would stand up for himself if he felt maligned and the club’s coaches learned very quickly that he was no pushover on the pitch. His first game for one of Liverpool’s junior sides was against bitter rivals Everton at Finch Farm and Sterling was flattened in the opening exchanges by Luke Garbutt, who had not long arrived from Leeds United.. But Sterling’s reaction was not to retreat but to face down such provocation and he went on to produce a man-of-the-match performance.
Sterling’s ascent, his metamorphosis from a shot-shy forward to a hungry, obsessive goalscorer, has been clear for all to see over the past year especially and he is now widely regarded as one of Europe’s best attackers, one with 18 goals in 21 games for club and country this season. Anfield, then, represented something of a final hurdle for a player who has too often gone missing in action at a ground he has yet to score in since leaving Liverpool. That statistic did not change on Sunday but it was comfortably Sterling’s strongest showing at his former club and the emotion after another rancorous reunion finally appeared to get the better of him.
The surprise, perhaps, is that he had not snapped before now.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2019/11/13/years-vilification-anfield-exit-may-root-raheem-sterling-meltdown/