Has Raheem Sterling reached his ceiling? What Manchester City need is certainty

Raheem Sterling made a dart in behind Vincent Kompany to receive an angled pass from Luis Suárez. His first touch, with the outside of his right foot, took him outside the line of the right-hand post, some 12 yards from goal, with Kompany and Joe Hart between him and the net. He turned back inside, opening an angle to curl a left-footed finish between Hart and Pablo Zabaleta into the bottom corner. Hart shuffled and Kompany closed in, only for Sterling to jink back and roll the ball through an implausibly large gap into the right side of the goal.

That was the opener in Liverpool’s 3-2 win over Manchester City in April 2014 but what makes it memorable was not just that it was a vital goal in the title race, rather the way Sterling conjured space where none had seemed to exist. It was that goal, more than anything, that led to the inflated expectations on Sterling going into the World Cup.

This was something unusual in an England player: who else has had the ability to do something quite so audacious, has had such coolness, such confidence in their technique? In the harum-scarum, hustle-and-bustle of the English game, Sterling seemed unique – and that in a player who was quick and a fine dribbler as well.

Eight years on, that moment seems illusory. The temptation is to doubt initial interpretations. Did Sterling really send Hart and Kompany the wrong way with a feigned shot? Or did they simply fail to anticipate him checking back on to his favoured right foot (only 30 of his 109 Premier League goals have come with his left)? With hindsight, perhaps that isn’t a deft change of direction, but an awkward drag to his stronger side that proved deceptive precisely because it was not the sort of thing top-class forwards would