Demarai Gray has returned to Birmingham City and is relishing resuming his Blues career ahead of the 2025/26 Championship season
Demarai Gray says Birmingham City will get his ‘best years’ after the winger secured an emotional homecoming after nearly a decade away.
Gray, a self-confessed Blues fan who came through the club’s academy to reach the first team before departing in January 2016, is back where it all began ahead of what is shaping up to be a mouthwatering Championship season.
Gray, who celebrated his 29th birthday just a few days ago, insists he still has plenty to offer and says he welcomes the pressure created by the moves the club has made in the transfer market.
Signings like Gray himself, Celtic legend Kyogo Furuhashi, England Under-21 goalkeeper James Beadle – to name but three – have seen Blues tipped to to challenge for back-to-back promotions.
It is not something he shies away from: “It’s obviously good that the club’s looked at in high regards and maybe to challenge and compete.” Gray told Blues TV.
“But from my experience, I know the Championship is difficult, it’s a long season, it’s relentless and we have to be on it.
“My beliefs are I’m sure we can challenge and compete and the club’s going to recruit. I’m here to add to the squad we’ve got now, and it’s a great squad, so I’m sure the club has its plans.
“But for me, I want to win, that’s what I want, I want the club to play at the highest level and that’s what I’ve come back to do, to experience those things and with the club’s ambition and productiveness, I know we’re more than capable.
“As long as we approach the season with the right mentality, everything has to align, the reason people are talking is because people can see it, so it’s down to us as a squad, players and managers to deliver the best we can and aim as high as we can.”
Gray returns to Blues after a couple of years with Al-Ettifaq in Saudi Arabia where he played 47 Pro League matches but had to fight to maintain fitness, with former coach Dean Holden saying: “We just weren’t able to get him on the pitch for long enough.”
However, Gray recovered from a late season niggle to play for Jamaica in the Gold Cup and he is relishing working under Chris Davies and Ben Petty again.
“I feel good physically, I feel fit I know my capabilities I don’t want to come on the camera now and say ‘I am going to do this or that’ because talk is cheap,” he said.
“But I believe in where I am at now, my ability, I am 29, I haven’t come back where I am at the back end of my career, where I have lost my pace. I do feel at the peak of my powers. I have come back where I can actually give Birmingham my best years.
“I have worked with Chris before and Ben, they know me as a player, they have watched me grow and develop. I feel like the club has got me at a great time.
“The gaffer was assistant when I was there [at Leicester], I know how he is as a man and as a coach, I think we had a good relationship I learned a lot in my time with him and Brendan.”