Sterling, alongside Ben Chilwell, found himself quickly left out of the Chelsea squad under new coach Enzo Maresca, who made clear that he wanted to get rid of the pair. The England winger then saw his shirt number handed to another player and ended up joining Arsenal on loan at the end of the summer transfer window as it became clear he would not get a chance at Stamford Bridge.

While Chelsea have been criticised for the way they treated the likes of Conor Gallagher and Trevoh Chalobah ahead of their summer moves, ex-Blues star Gallas feels Sterling should "blame" himself for his departure as he failed to perform in the two years since he joined from Manchester City.

"Sometimes players need to blame themselves when things don’t work out at their club. Raheem Sterling was in the situation that he was at Chelsea because he didn’t perform for two years," Gallas told Gambling Zone. "He didn’t score or create enough goals and the new manager would’ve watched him and made the decision that he doesn’t want him in his squad, that’s not the manager’s fault. Now everybody is interested to see how he does at Arsenal and sometimes players need to feel the love of their manager to get the best out of them. For me personally, I didn’t need to feel that from a manager. Even if the manager didn’t like me I had to make sure I was playing well enough that he couldn’t afford to put me on the bench."

After missing out on the first few weeks of the season, Sterling will hope to get his first taste of Premier League football in 2024-25 when Arsenal come up against Tottenham in a north London derby on September 15.