Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher clash over ‘unusual’ Raheem Sterling statement

Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher took differing opinions on Raheem Sterling’s contentious public statement prior to Chelsea’s opening Premier League fixture.

Enzo Maresca left Sterling out of his first matchday squad of the season as his side fell to a 2-0 defeat against Manchester City at Stamford Bridge.

But there was off-pitch drama too, as just before kick-off Sterling’s camp issued a statement demanding ‘clarity’ from the manager and the club about the forward’s exclusion from the game.

The Englishman is one of several players in Chelsea’s bloated squad to face an uncertain future and, while he accepted the timing was unusual, Neville believes Sterling’s statement was trying to stand up for his teammates in a similar predicament.

‘I can never agree with a player putting a statement out an hour and a half before kick-off, because of the fact that he’s got colleagues and team-mates, and I think that you respect them,’ Neville said on Sky Sports.

‘Forget the club. Forget the manager. It happened with Wayne Rooney at Manchester United once. “You’re our team-mate. Don’t distract from what we’re doing”.

‘So, I think Raheem probably needs to go in and have a chat with the player” and say, “Look, that was poor timing”.

‘What I would say is, for Raheem – who I think’s a really good lad, I love him to bits, I worked with him for a long time – he’s experienced now and I think if he’s looking at everything that’s happening behind the scenes there, for him to do what he did yesterday, he must be seeing stuff that he doesn’t like and feels like he needs to punch back.

‘And he might be punching back on behalf of himself. But he may be punching back on behalf of [Conor] Gallagher, he may be punching back on behalf of [Trevor] Chalobah, who’s with the development squad.

‘He might be thinking, “I’ve got to alert people to what’s going on here. The only way I can do that is through my own situation”.

‘Because it is unusual to put a statement out like that and I wouldn’t expect Raheem Sterling to have done that.’

Carragher, meanwhile, who labelled the statement ‘ridiculous’ on social media, was less forgiving of Sterling action’s and believes the 29-year-old was only thinking about himself.

‘He’s not doing that for the team or the dressing room. He’s thinking about himself. He’s not John Terry or Frank Lampard at Chelsea looking after the club,’ the former Liverpool defender responded.

‘He’s made a mistake, his PR team or his agent – whatever. He should just basically come out, apologise to the manager and just get cracking in training. I don’t think he’s looking after anybody else.’

After Sunday’s defeat to City, Chelsea’s new boss Maresca insisted the decision to leave Sterling out of the squad was purely tactical but conceded the forward could well leave the club before the end of the window.

‘The only thing I can say is that it was a technical decision and in the next day, we will want to sit and clarify the situation but it is nothing more than that,’ the Italian said.

‘For all the players, they are Chelsea players. If they are going to be Chelsea players, then we will try to use them but no more than a technical decision.

‘I want Raheem Sterling but I want all the 30 players we have. But there is no space for all of them. So for some of them, they have to leave.’

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