InterviewJordan Henderson on feeling good, Forest test and Benfica tie
Jordan Henderson leads the way for Liverpool in more ways than one.
No Reds player has made more appearances so far this season than the captain, with the midweek victory over Arsenal at Emirates Stadium his 40th game of the campaign by mid-March.
Henderson, though, insists he is physically and mentally prepared to keep driving Jürgen Klopp’s team forward in their bid to win an unprecedented quadruple, which continues with an Emirates FA Cup quarter-final at Nottingham Forest on Sunday.
“I feel good, to be honest. I feel ready,” the skipper told Liverpoolfc.com.
“I just take it game by game, prepare myself the best way I can to make sure I am in the best shape possible for the next game and take it from there.
“Obviously training and games can be intense but I think the coaching staff have done really well in using all the squad, tinkering training a little bit to make sure that we feel fresh going into games and giving the lads a little rest period whenever needed.
“So yeah, I think the majority of the squad has been looking strong and, touch wood, we can continue that right through until the end of the season because we’ll have a lot of games. Hopefully we can have everyone available.”
The weekend trip to the City Ground and Liverpool’s upcoming Champions League last-eight meeting with Benfica were also on the agenda as we sat down with Henderson at the AXA Training Centre.
Read on for more from the captain…
Jordan, Forest are a Championship side but they are in great form and they’ll be at home on Sunday, so are you expecting a really tough evening?
Yeah, definitely. You look at how well they’ve been playing, I think they’ve played a couple of Premier League sides at home – Arsenal and Leicester – and they beat them both, so that just shows how tough it can be going there and how well they are doing. I’m sure the atmosphere will be electric and it’ll be a very tough evening for us as a team but we need to make it tough for them also and at the end of the day, if we do our job like we know we can and perform to the levels that we’re capable of then we should be confident enough to go there and get through to the next round. But yeah, of course it’s never going to be easy and they will make it as tough as possible so we’ve got to be 100 per cent otherwise we won’t get through again to a semi-final.
Before Brighton last week, the manager said how important it is to go into games being humble and prepared to work harder than the opposition. Is this another match where the attitude and mentality needs to be absolutely spot on from the first whistle?
One hundred per cent. I think you get different challenges throughout the season and it’s how you deal with them, but the thing that doesn’t change is the effort, the work-rate, the attitude that goes into our performances and our games should always remain no matter who the opponent is. And if we play, like I said, to the levels and the intensity that we’re capable of, we should cause them real problems on the night.
It’s a chance to get to Wembley again, too. Does the fact you could be back there so soon after winning the Carabao Cup for the FA Cup semi-final add a little bit of extra motivation to this tie?
It’s another big opportunity for us as a team to get back to Wembley again and another big game in a semi-final. So yeah, it’ll be tough, as we’ve just spoke about, and they’ll make it as hard as possible but it’s our job to make sure that we leave the stadium having won the game and go through to the next round. That’s the most important thing.
Inside Wembley: Reds win Carabao Cup
The FA Cup is one of the few trophies you haven’t won yet at Liverpool. Does that give the competition a bit of extra significance to you personally?
Not really. I just concentrate on the next game and whoever we’re playing, whatever competition. In terms of trophies, you want to win as many as possible and of course the FA Cup is always a big tournament to play in and you always want to win it. Unfortunately we haven’t been able to do that for a long time, but it’s another opportunity there for us at the weekend to get one step closer and we need to give it everything to make sure that happens.
On the Champions League, what is your reaction to being drawn against Benfica in the last eight?
We’re glad to be in the quarter-finals. It’s always going to be tough, to be honest, no matter who you get, so I don’t really look too much at that. Whoever we get, we concentrate on that and we give it everything like we always do. Benfica will obviously be another difficult opponent, they knocked Ajax out of the last round, who I think were unbeaten up until that point and away from home as well they won. So it’ll be a tough test for us again but it always is in the Champions League, especially in the knockout rounds.
The second leg will be at home. Is it a bonus to know that whatever happens in Portugal you’ve got a game at Anfield to come back to?
Yeah, I suppose so if you look at it like that. I know the away goal rule doesn’t count now so it doesn’t really make too much of a difference, but I suppose going back to Anfield and having the second leg there probably helps a little bit.
It’s the fourth time in five seasons you’ve reached the quarter-finals of the Champions League – how much does that experience help once you get to the business end of the tournament?
A lot of us have experienced big Champions League games over the last few years, for sure. But we know they’re never easy, we know that they’ll be always tough opponents who will give everything – like I said, especially in knockout rounds. So we need to be at our best if we want to go through to the semi-final.