Only Euros glory could top treble says former Aston Villa man Jack Grealish

The 28-year-old played a pivotal role in City capturing the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League as Pep Guardiola’s side swept away all in front of them.

Grealish has endured an injury-hit start to the new campaign as a severe dead leg saw him miss almost a month of action.

He returned to the City starting line-up for their 3-1 Champions League win at RB Leipzig last week and is back in the England squad ahead of the upcoming Wembley double-header against Australia and Italy.

Grealish admits building on such a historic 2022/23 season is no mean feat but is targeting tournament success with England to continue a fine period of his career.

“I don’t mean this to sound weird but it is difficult in a way because you have such a high of winning the treble and then you do think ‘what would ever top that?’,” he said.

“Obviously doing something at international level definitely would. But then even at club-level you think ‘what would top it?’ Maybe to win all four including the Carabao Cup, but we went out of that last week. You probably think about doing an ‘Invincible’ season but we got beat. To do what we did last year again would be unbelievable and to do something at international level with this group of players would be unbelievable.

“After the season that I had with City, it was an unbelievable season, one of the best of my career especially in the second half of the season when I was playing a lot more, playing with confidence.”

Grealish reckons England boss Gareth Southgate has “one of the hardest jobs in the world” – not made easier by what he feels is an unrivalled amount of talent in attacking positions.

Likewise, Southgate hailed the changes he has seen in Grealish since his move to the Etihad Stadium from Villa in 2021.

“He has grown as a player,” said Southgate. “He has always been a fabulous talent and I’ve always got to be careful not to upset Villa fans but I think moving to a club where he had to win every week, pressure on every week and demands of his coach you develop different attributes and become a more rounded player and those experiences are with him now.

“He has great experiences with us, with his club, we have got different personalities in our squad and characters like Jack, like James Maddison, like Trent (Alexander-Arnold), lads that view the world differently, see the pitch differently, that’s what makes the squad.”