Henderson Says They’ll Keep Taking It Game By Game

Despite the setback against Manchester City last week, Liverpool are still at the top of the league with at least a four point gap between them and second place. It’s not fake news, it’s real life, and it’s still real life and will be real life next weekend too. It’s the closest Liverpool have been to winning the league in a very long time. There’s a whole lot of emotions mixed up in that and every ounce of focus is needed to keep their heads down. Our captain Jordan Henderson is the only remaining member from that squad that ran that heartbreaking title challenge ins 2013/2014, so he’s the only one that knows what it might take to get them over the line (definitely not a soft red card challenge from him, that’s for sure).

Biggest advice? Focus on the next game and only the next game.

“Obviously you can use that experience as much as possible,” Henderson told the club website. “But in my mind and all of the lads’ minds is just: ‘Take it game by game.’

“That’s all we can do and is what we have been doing up to this point – so why change it?

“The next game is the biggest game of the season, that’s how we look at it, and it’s a tough one again next week. We will keep taking it game by game and come the end of the season, let’s see where we are.”

They've done very well to get this far on that advice, having only lost one match in the league so far. Literally half the season is left to play and while big matches against Arsenal, Manchester United, and Manchester City have already been dispatched, there are still matchups against Chelsea and Tottenham left as our biggest obstacles. Naturally, though, every game - not just the Big Six teams - are most important. That continued with the tough match up against Brighton on Saturday.

“It was tough but we expected it to be tough,” continued the skipper, when asked for his thoughts regarding the Brighton match up.

“Brighton are a good team, especially at home. They defended really well and were organised and tough to break down. It was a very mature performance.

“We managed to get the goal and also defended well to keep the clean sheet, so overall we are delighted with the three points. But we can still be better and that’s what we will try to do.”

His sentiments echo those of boss Jürgen Klopp regarding the maturity of the performance and it seems that Liverpool have learned where to conserve their energies and where to go all out. Of course now, the focus is back on the next match - Crystal Palace next Saturday, at home. (It had to be Crystal Palace).

“We have spoken enough about the last two games,” said Henderson.

“All of our focus was on this game and you can only have the opportunity to get the three points in your next game; that’s what we had here and that’s what all the concentration was on.

“We are still very confident as a group and very together, as you can see. That plays a big part in confidence going forward and you could see we didn’t lose our confidence. We kept our nerve, were patient and got the job done.”