Stevan Jovetic says Manchester City fans were never able to see him at his best due to his lack of opportunities in the Premier League, and now wants to make up for lost time with Inter Milan by guiding them back to the Champions League.
Jovetic, 25, joined Inter on a year-and-a-half loan deal in July, with a permanent transfer agreed that could earn City £14.25 million.
The Montenegrin struggled for form and fitness after leaving Fiorentina for City in 2013, saying last week that he was frustrated by his treatment in England.
Without wanting directly to criticise Mauricio Pellegrini -- "no, no, I don't want to be controversial" -- Jovetic said in an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport that he did not feel he was given enough of a chance to show his true value.
"If I meet [Pellegrini], I will say hello to him, of course, because even this experience helped me," Jovetic said. "I don't know why I wasn't playing.
"In the end, he never explained it to me. One day I went to him and asked him to play me for three or four games in a row. Well it never happened, amen.
"I never even played in the games after I had scored a goal, so I think that says it all. The day I discovered I was not part of City's Champions League squad, I wanted to leave. I want to play in the Champions League here with Inter."
Jovetic made an ideal start to life with the Nerazzurri, scoring the winner against Atalanta on the opening day of the season -- his second debut in Serie A.
"It was the same emotion with Fiorentina, when I scored against Sporting Lisbon to qualify for the Champions League group stage," he said.
"Anyhow, it was an incredible joy, to score a goal like that, one minute from time on my debut in our stadium. The first people I called after that goal were my mum and dad."
Jovetic does not want to hear of any talk of Inter winning Serie A this season, adding: "That's not something we can talk about, other than to say that the candidates are Juventus and Roma, and then there are us, Napoli, Fiorentina, Milan and Lazio.
"We can talk about third place because we have the strength to get there."