The Brazilian suffered a dip in form in the middle of the season having made a blistering start to his Barclays Premier League career.

However, the 26-year-old was influential throughout City's win at the Stadium of Light on Saturday, netting from the penalty spot and setting up Darius Vassell's dramatic late winner.

And Eriksson hopes his playmaker will continue to impress for the rest of the season.

worked hard

Eriksson said: "It's good to see a player like Elano coming back and doing so many good things again, because we need the real Elano and I hope he stays like this until the end of the season.

"He's been out of form a little bit for some time, he and Petrov have been important for us in terms of scoring and creating goals all season. Petrov was out of the team for a while, Elano was out of form so it's good to see them back like this.

"Elano's the player with imagination who can see things, play team-mates in and score goals as well, but he worked hard defensively against Sunderland as well. That was important with what kind of game we knew it would be."