Mauricio Pochettino has made a pact with Raheem Sterling: work with me and you’ll be back in the England team before Euro 2024.
The Chelsea manager is enjoying the fruits of Sterling’s revival at Chelsea, a rigorous pre-season seeing the forward back to something like his Manchester City form, though Gareth Southgate did not recall him for England in last week’s internationals.
Sterling endured a terrible first campaign at the club after his £47million move from City, the nadir being booed by his own fans at Bournemouth, where Chelsea take on Andoni Iraola’s side on Sunday.