“I came in from training (at Man City) and there was a missed call from Sven, so I called him back,” he said.
“He was going into Notts County and said ‘do you want to come?’.
“I’ll be honest, at that point, I didn’t care who it was.
“If I could go, I would go. But I told him (Sven) that I doubted they (City) would let me go.
“Sven called someone at City and they made it happen.
“It ended up being a free as well. It was the best decision ever for me.
“City were great to me in so many ways for the education and the people I was able to work with.
“I will be forever grateful for that.
“Notts County were League Two and they had they great plans.
“Things were happening and I was like 'wow these guys are serious'.
“It was a mad season because we were flying private jets to game.
“It was all a farce and I had signed a five-year contract.
“The plans Sven showed me were amazing but we got to September and I didn’t get paid.
“October, November, December and I think we got to March or April and I still hadn’t been paid.
“I knew something was wrong but I didn’t care because I just wanted to play football.
“Sven had left by then. We had Hans Backe in as coach and we ended up with Steve Cotterill.
“He saw the job through. We were ninth when he came and we won the league. It was an amazing season."