Raheem Sterling Pleads Guilty to Dangerous Driving Charges

Raheem Sterling has pleaded guilty to dangerous driving after crashing a Lamborghini on a series of motorways earlier this year.

The former England forward appeared at Basingstoke magistrates court on Tuesday, where he admitted driving a Lamborghini Urus dangerously on the M25, the M3 and the A327 before a crash on 28 May.

Sterling, 31, also pleaded guilty to possessing six nitrous oxide canisters for wrongful inhalation – a class C drug – and to failing to provide a specimen.

He arrived at the Hampshire court smartly dressed in a black suit jacket, black trousers, black shoes and a dark top, cutting a very different figure from the one that lit up Premier League stadiums for the best part of a decade.

Police from Hampshire and Isle of Wight constabulary had previously confirmed the charges stemmed from a single-vehicle collision on the M3 southbound, near the Minley interchange, on 28 May. No other cars were involved and no injuries were reported.

It marks a stark off-field turn for a player who became one of the defining English forwards of his generation.

Sterling scored 20 goals in 82 appearances for England, a key part of Gareth Southgate’s side that reached the 2018 World Cup semi-finals and the Euro 2020 final, where his direct running and goals were central to the team’s resurgence on the international stage.

His club journey began in the academy at QPR before a move to Liverpool, where he broke into the first team as a teenager and quickly emerged as one of the Premier League’s brightest young talents.

Manchester City made their move in 2015. Across seven seasons at the Etihad, Sterling became a serial winner: four Premier League titles, five League Cups and the FA Cup in 2019, his speed and movement helping to define Pep Guardiola’s attack.

The story has been more fractured since. Sterling left City for Chelsea in 2022, but after slipping down the pecking order at Stamford Bridge, he spent the 2024–25 season on loan at Arsenal.

Earlier this year, after his Chelsea exit, he joined Dutch side Feyenoord on a short-term deal until the end of the season. That contract has now expired and he is currently without a club, his future on the pitch uncertain as his situation off it comes under the spotlight.

Sterling’s fall into legal trouble sits in sharp contrast with the recognition he received only a few years ago. In the 2021 Queen’s birthday honours, he was awarded an MBE for services to racial equality in sport, having fronted anti-racism and anti-discrimination campaigns and spoken forcefully about racism on and off the pitch over several years.

A career that once seemed to move only upwards now pauses at a crossroads – both in football and in the courts.