It has been over five years since Premier League fans got their first glimpse of Raheem Sterling.

The speedy young winger mesmerised defenders with his skill and quickly became a key figure in Liverpool’s squad.

In 2014, he was awarded the Golden Boy award, given to Europe’s best U21 player and won previously by Wayne Rooney, Lionel Messi and Paul Pogba.

He scored 23 goals during his time at Anfield, and his performance and potential earned him a move to Manchester City. The Sky Blues spent an initial £44million to make Sterling the club’s most expensive player until the arrival of Kevin De Bruyne later in the 2015 summer window.

Sterling has had a mixed couple of seasons at the Etihad, as like all wingers he has struggled with inconsistency. In his first campaign, he scored 11 goals and created 10 more, but Manuel Pellegrini used the England international sparingly in the final months of his managerial career at City.

The 22-year-old responded well when Pep Guardiola took over, as the he picked up the Premier League’s Player of the Month award for August. Although he wasn’t able to better his goal tally from the season before and his finishing still needs work, his 21 assists in 47 appearances proved that he is developing the other aspects of his game and contributing to his teammates’ success on the pitch as well as his own.

But that was last season, and this upcoming campaign is the most important one of his career so far.

In his first two seasons, there wasn’t a lot of competition for playing time, and the competition that did exist was far below Sterling’s quality. In 2015-16, he competed with Jesus Navas and Patrick Roberts for playing time.

Last season, Navas, Nolito and Leroy Sané were his main competitors. This term, however, the England winger must battle it out with a much-improved Sané, Roberts, Bernardo Silva and occasionally Kevin De Bruyne or David Silva.

Still only young, Sterling isn’t anywhere close to approaching his prime but nevertheless approaches a very important stage in his career. If the winger has a poor season, fellow youngsters Sané, Roberts and Bernardo Silva will all be right there to take his place in the starting XI.

Having easy access to consistent playing time was great for Sterling in his first two years at the Etihad Stadium, but now he has to earn it.

https://video.footballfancast.com/video-2015/pub-facts12.mp4