Patrick Roberts reveals secret about Man City move and desire to get back to the top

Ex Manchester City player Patrick Roberts is aiming to get back to the top of the game after joining "big, ambitious club" Sunderland.

Roberts in 2015 joined City from Fulham in a deal worth just over £6million but failed to force his way into the first team at the Etihad Stadium. He was loaned out to seven clubs during his time with City, including Celtic, Norwich, Girona and most recently at Troyes.

But his City spell played out as expected. Roberts says loan moves from City was always the plan in order to learn and mature as a player.

He told SunderlandEcho: “It wasn't the idea at the start to play for Man City, the idea was to get a good loan and do well somewhere else.”

“Which I did at Celtic. So definitely, I'd say go on loan, playing for a first team in an environment where obviously you have to grow up and mature and play well for other people to see and speak about you.”

After signing for Sunderland, Roberts is looking ahead in order to really ignite his career. And he has high hopes for the club in the remaining months of the season.

He said: “If you ask anyone they want to be in a team that's winning. It's hard to keep that consistency up.”

Sunderland currently sit sixth in the table and are chasing promotion back to the Championship. Roberts is looking forward to helping the team on the pitch.

Roberts said: “We’ve got some big games coming up with not many breaks and I’ve just got to be ready and stay as fit as possible and grind out the wins and play good football in the meantime.”

Sunderland face promotion rivals Wigan on Saturday.

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