Card tricks, sing songs, quizzes, cheerleading – Jordan Henderson can probably now add juggling to his entertainment repertoire.
The midfielder juggled a series of potentially difficult topics all while displaying a relaxed and jovial temperament on Tuesday, as questions were thrown at him during England’s Euro 2020 campaign launch day ahead of their tournament opener against Croatia on Sunday.
Missed penalties, players taking the knee to booing from their own fans, that scathing criticism from Roy Keane about why, having not played since February due to a groin injury, Henderson was being included in the squad as some kind of circus performer.
Yet regardless of what Keane thinks, Henderson has become one of England’s most important players and it is easy to see why Gareth Southgate likes him so much, why England’s manager desperately wants him around the camp, even if he is unable to start every game.
Keane was speaking on ITV ahead of the Romania friendly on Sunday when he said, “I’ve heard people say they want him around the place – for what? Does he do card tricks? Does he have a sing song? Does he do quizzes in the evenings?
“What does he do? Jordan’s an experienced player. Surely Jordan doesn’t want to be around the place as some sort of cheerleader – you want to play and he’s clearly nowhere near it.”
Henderson chuckled when it was mentioned to him on Tuesday and explained why, in his view, Keane warrants a free pass. “To be fair to Roy, he can say what he wants about me. He give us me debut and I wouldn’t be here without him giving us that,” he said. “I found it quite funny.”
Henderson pointed out that he and Southgate know a few more of the finer details about his situation, how much hard work and training he has been doing to get fit for the tournament, and his eventual inclusion. He insisted he is fit enough to start on Sunday and play the tournament, if called upon.
“Everyone’s going to have an opinion, everybody’s going to think they know better than everybody else,” he said.
“But for me all my focus has been on the last couple of months, working as hard as I possibly can to be in a position where I can contribute in the tournament and I’m very thankful I’m in that position now.”
Nonetheless, for all Southgate’s talk of Henderson’s character and personality, the player is there to play, above all else, surely? “And the card tricks [Keane] was on about – I’ve got a few of them up me sleeve!
“Listen, as a player you want to play and I’m not coming here just to be around the camp, like Roy was saying. I want to come here and I want to contribute in the games. How much of that is not really down to me, it’s up to the manager to make a decision.
“But whenever I’m called upon, I’ll be ready and hopefully I can make a big contribution to this tournament and our success going forward.”
Henderson will be 31 next week: he has been around, seen a lot, won the Premier League and Champions League with Liverpool and reached the World Cup semi-finals, in 2018, with England. He seemingly defies time, improving as a player when his career should’ve been waning, reaching his peak later than most footballers in his position.
Although he still makes mistakes. After coming on as a substitute against Romania to test his fitness, he annoyed Southgate by taking the ball from Dominic Calvert-Lewin after England had won a penalty, only to miss it.
On Tuesday, Henderson gave the impression that – with the two main penalty-takers not on the field – he was not defying the established order, but believing it was up for grabs. Afterwards, Southgate said he would speak to the player about it, although the Henderson claimed that conversation was yet to happen.
“Listen you miss penalties, it can happen, a lot of players have missed them,” Henderson added. “I’ll continue to practise them and if I need to take one I need to make sure I’m ready, because you never know what can happen, especially going into a tournament, as we saw [at the World Cup] with the penalty shootout [against Colombia]. All you can do is keep practising.”
And the same presumably goes for those card tricks, the sing songs, the quizzes, cheerleading – and juggling.
from Football – inews.co.uk https://ift.tt/2ScH3zv
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