Jordan Henderson on Salzburg decider, Sadio Mane and rotation
Jordan Henderson has detailed Liverpool's focus on sealing qualification for the Champions League last 16 with a positive result against Salzburg.
The Reds captain spoke to the media during a press conference in Austria on the eve of the final match of Group E.
A draw or win would see Henderson’s side into the knockout stages of a competition they won last season and he explained why the tie represents the ‘biggest’ game of the campaign so far.
The skipper also discussed what Liverpool learned from the thrilling 4-3 victory over Salzburg at Anfield, the recent rotation of the team, Sadio Mane’s form and more…
On tackling incidents of racism in football…
It’s a topic that we’re probably speaking about a little bit too much at the minute, especially what I’ve experienced recently on international duty. It’s obviously not a nice topic to speak about but it’s one that we need to come together as players, clubs and supporters and stand together to fight it; stronger punishments, more education. It’s obviously a problem that we can’t pretend is just happening in every other country and not in ours, it’s happening everywhere really. We need to try to fight it as best as we can.
On the Premier League title race…
Well, I only like looking to the next game, to be honest. You might be bored of me saying that but that’s the truth. The next game is the most important game and the biggest game of the season, which is tomorrow night. That’s all the focus is on. We know it’ll be a difficult game and a tough challenge for us, so we need to be 100 per cent focused on that to go out and give everything to get into the next round.
On the pressure involved with trying to seal qualification…
I think it’s the same. We need to perform, we need to get a result to get through to the next round, which we’ve proven we can do before. But that doesn’t mean it’s going to be easy and we’re going to do it again. But we can learn from those experiences and we know what we need to do. We know it’ll be difficult but we also have confidence in our own ability. I feel as though if we perform to the level that we have been, and we’re capable of, then we can get a good result.
On what Liverpool learned from the first meeting with Salzburg…
They’re a very dangerous side, you can see that from the campaign they’ve had and from the game we played at Anfield. They can hurt you on the counter-attack, defensively organised, good from set-pieces – so they’re very dangerous. We’ve obviously looked back on that game and looked at things we need to improve on, and hopefully we can do that tomorrow night.
On recent changes showing the strength of the Reds squad…
We have got great strength in depth in the squad. We have been making changes and that hasn’t affected performances, that’s the most important thing. We just want to continue on that path, we’ve got a lot of games in a short space of time so we’re going to need everybody. So far it has worked really well, so we just want to continue that and keep giving everything for the team.
On whether this is the point of the tournament when the players start feeling ‘greedy’ for the trophy…
We want to continue to show how well we can play and how much we can improve as a team. We still want to keep getting better, we still want to perform at a high level. That’s always going to be the case, no matter what competition it is. Every single game is the next biggest game for us and the next biggest challenge. Tomorrow night is a big challenge for us as a team and we want to go out there and show what we’re capable of doing.
On what it’s like to play with Mane…
Amazing, of course, not only Sadio but every other player. We’ve got so much talent in the squad and Sadio has been outstanding for a long period of time now. He just needs to continue in that form. He is a fantastic person off the pitch, works really hard and dedicates his life to football. It’s great to see him doing as well as he can. We just want to see him continue in that form and keep doing what he’s been doing for a long period of time now.