Robinho's £32.5million to Manchester City appears to still be a shock to the player himself.

"On the last day, Chelsea made me a great proposal and I accepted it," he said, to which a reporter replied: "You mean Manchester right?". "Yeah, Manchester, sorry!" answered Robinho, who joined City on Monday.

But the gaffe aside, the Brazilian could barely hide his relief at having moved away from Real Madrid, even though only 24 hours previous to the move he spoke openly of his "desperation" to join Chelsea.

And he said he hoped his reputation will not be tarnished by the manner in which he left La Liga champions.

"Unfortunately this kind of thing happens," he said. "Of course I don't want to fight and I don't like to be criticised in the press, with people saying I'm not a professional and that I don't follow what my contract says.

"I want to do what is written in my contract until it lasts! I don't want to be criticised and have my image damaged. Unfortunately this thing happened twice (with me), so be it!"

Real president Ramon Calderon had insisted he had no choice but to let Robinho leave the club, saying: "When he talked about his situation he cried and asked to leave Spain."

But Robinho hit back, saying: "I didn't cry. I just told him that I would like to leave. Since he was desperate because he didn't hire anyone, he pretended not to listen me.

"At the end, he made things even worse for me to leave, but I didn't cry. I only told him the truth, that was, if the club didn't want me to stay there, then I didn't want to stay at Real either. I wanted him to let me go, through the front door, without any fight."

Legendary Brazilian football Pele has criticised Robinho's decision to join City, but the 24-year-old defended his decision.

"Look, I accept Pele's criticism. He is the king of football. But, maybe, if he were in my shoes, he would have done the same thing," added Robinho.

"I think that only someone who suffered as I suffered in Real Madrid may have something to say on this. People from outside, judging (this situation) is easy."