Former Manchester City striker Shaun Goater heaped praise on the newly crowned English Premier champions who clinched the title on goal difference over city rivals Manchester United on the final day of the season.City trailed visiting Queen’s Park Rangers 2-1 heading into stoppage time. But late goals from sub Edin Dzeko and Sergio Aguero lifted City to their first top flight title in 44 years before their own fans at Ethiad Stadium.Pablo Zabaleta netted City’s other goal while Djibril Cisse and Jamie Mackie replied for QPR who had Joey Barton sent off for striking out at City’s Carlos Tevez and Ageuro.With their title hopes slipping away as the match entered stoppage time, Goater, who netted 104 goals for City between 1998 and 2003, admitted he had doubts his former club could pull it off.“My stomach was twisting and turning and I was sick at one stage and didn’t want to watch the match,” he told The Royal Gazette. “I think it was the first time I found myself not wanting to watch football which was crazy.“There were a lot of people thinking the championship was going to slip away. We had loads of corners and shots and when Mario Balotelli had a header saved from about four or five yards you started to think it just wasn’t going to be.“But then you get to the last minutes and get an equaliser by Dzeko and Aguero pops up and scores the winner and you’re saying to yourself ‘oh no, this is not real’. I thought it would be a close game, but not that close. You can’t get much closer than that.“Then to learn that United fans were celebrating because 90 minutes are gone and it’s 2-1 QPR just makes it that much better. Normally in the last 10-15 years injury time has been such a benefit for someone like Alex Ferguson but this was the one time it hasn’t gone in his favour. I can imagine what the city of Manchester is like right now, it’s just covered in blue.”The last time City won the title, in 1968, Goater wasn’t even born.“This achievement is so great because the fans have waited such a long time,” he said. “City have been through so much as a club emotionally and really deserve the championship and I am very, very excited.”City’s coronation as Premier League champions was the culmination of a revival that began over a decade earlier during Goater’s time at the English club when they slipped as far down as League One.That they managed to turn their fortunes around quickly and make it back to the top tier owed much to Goater’s remarkable goalscoring prowess.Goater led the scoring charts at City for multiple seasons and also netted three goals in Manchester derbies against United, including a memorable brace on home turf against Ferguson’s team. He also holds the distinction of scoring the fastest goal by a sub in the Premier League.“When I was at City a few weeks ago it was mentioned that without my goals and the team making sharp promotions we might’ve found ourselves almost like Leeds,” Goater said. “Some of these big teams that get relegated find it very difficult to find their way back up.“We could’ve been a team like Leeds but fortunately that wasn’t the case.”