Jordan Henderson was selected as captain for England against Malta
The Liverpool skipper knows he is vying with leading England figures like Harry Kane, Gary Cahill and Joe Hart for the job, but Henderson has had a taste now, and wants more.
England coach Gareth Southgate gave Henderson the armband in Malta on Friday night and watched his team eventually clear the latest hurdle in Group F as they won 4-0 in Valletta, without impressing.
And he will lead Southgate’s team for the fourth time in his 10 games in charge of England, which puts the 27-year-old at the front of the pack in with a chance of the captaincy. But he is well aware of Southgate’s plans to rotate the job throughout this season to give everyone a chance.
Even though he has been given the honour ahead of Kane, Cahill and Hart, and he knows Southgate plans to give other an opportunity before the World Cup, Henderson does not hide his ambition.
“Of course I want the job,” he said. “I’m sure anyone would want to captain their country and I’m no different.
Harry Kane puts England ahead against Malta
Anyone would want to captain their country and I’m no different
England star Jordan Henderson
“We’ve had conversations about changing it. Harry was captain in the last squad, Gary and Joe have done it before, I’ve done it before and it’s about sharing that responsibility as a group and as a team. That’s important going forward.
“There’s a few people who can do the job, but the gaffer doesn’t want to give that responsibility to one person, he wants to divide it and it’s a good idea.
“We’ve got a few leaders in the team but also young people coming through who can lead and the gaffer’s idea is to bring them through.
“It’s a huge honour to captain your country but we’ve spoken together to the gaffer, he wants to bring leaders through.
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Gareth Southgate has yet to decide who his permanent England captain will be
“I’m sure that’ll change through the campaign, different people will be captaining the team, and it’s good that we’ll encourage more leaders. But it is brilliant to captain my country again, of course.”
England’s uninspiring performance in Malta was given a gloss it barely deserved by the late flurry of goals from Kane, Ryan Bertrand and Danny Welbeck, after Kane had opened the door in the 53rd minute.
Henderson was energetic and purposeful, but did not get a grip on the midfield. In response to impatient fans who at times jeered Southgate’s team and were leaving in droves before the final whistle, he warned that the process of forging a team that can compete at the finals next summer is not an easy one.
“You can understand the fans being frustrated. They travel a long way and they want to see us scoring goals, creating chances,” he said. “That’s totally their choice that they left before the end.
“Of course we have to thank the fans no matter what, because they travelled a long way to see us and support us.
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“But sometimes in football it doesn’t always work out like that. You’ve got to be patient, you’ve got to be professional and I felt we did that and did the job in the end.
“When you’re jogging off the pitch you can hear it sometimes but when you’re playing the game, you’re focused on what you need to do, how you need to break the team down, and the lads did that brilliantly.
“In the second half we did a good job, scored some good goals, kept a clean sheet, so there’s some positives to take from the game.
“In the first half, we were trying the killer ball and it wasn’t coming off. At half-time we just said, ‘Keep going, we know as the game goes on we will get more chances’. With the forward players that we’ve got, we knew that if we got them in front of goal then we would score goals.
“In the end it was a good result, a professional performance at times.”
