Jordan Henderson: The new definition of a box-to-box midfielder

Jordan Henderson: The midfield engine

This weekend’s Premier League action saw all sorts of drama but none more so than the back and forth nature of Liverpool’s enticing encounter against Swansea on Sunday afternoon.

The Champions League hopefuls would undoubtedly have had this tie down as an easy three points considering some of the big-match scalps they’ve collected of late. Yet, the Welsh side had other ideas and made an incredible game of it all.

In the end, Liverpool, as they seem to continuously be doing at the moment came out on top of a seven goal thriller by four goals to three, both Daniel Sturridge and Jordan Henderson having gotten on the scoresheet with a double apiece.

Yet, it was the midfielder more than anyone else who deserved such a return for his performance on the day. For even though Swansea had looked Liverpool’s equal for much of the match, the Sunderland youth product looked as though he was in a league of his own throughout the match.

True Attacking threat

The best place to start with young Henderson and the excellent performance he put in against Swansea on Sunday is, of course, the manner in which he facilitated Liverpool’s attacking manoeuvres throughout the match.

The English midfielder began the game on the right hand side of Liverpool’s trio in the middle of the park, with Steven Gerrard and Philippe Coutinho to his left, and Daniel Sturridge ahead of him as the conventional forward. Yet, what actually occurred was quite different to what this line-up would suggest.

Sturridge’s natural desire for width obviously pulled him out right, occasionally, and when we partner that with Luis Suarez’s tendency to drift all over the pitch it opened up a natural gap between the two forwards that clearly enabled Henderson’s favoured late runs into the Swansea box.

Of the three goalscoring chances Henderson was involved with – two of which having accounted for Henderson’s brace – each came from the right hand side of Liverpool’s attack, yet central enough as to allow the midfielder to hit a shot at goal. Effectively, Henderson was essentially playing the role of a younger Steven Gerrard, or even Frank Lampard, through the manner in which he was able to time his late runs into the box so well.

It was these runs, and the system that allowed him to do so, that enabled him to score two goals and win the game for Liverpool on the day.

Midfield Guard Dog

Now Henderson was naturally on the pitch to play in an attacking sense, but as many Liverpool fans will be well aware the young midfielder is also an outstanding guard dog in the centre of the pitch too.

This season the English international has made on average four defensive actions per game. Not quite record breaking when we compare him to some of the central defenders or even Gerrard, in his defensive midfield role, but much higher than Joe Allan (2), Raheem Sterling (1) and Philippe Coutinho(1).

Jordan Henderson tackling data

In fact, if we were to note where Henderson actually makes the tackles in the first place, it says quite a lot about the manner in which Rodgers has this side playing football at the moment. As we can see he actually only made two tackles in Sunday’s game, but where they were made shows just how high up the pitch the midfielder is tackling; closing down defensive midfielders and defenders while the team as a whole try to squeeze the opposition into their own half.

Liverpool enjoy and often benefit from closing teams down very quickly and as we can see here, Henderson is one of the best in the squad at doing so.

Long-distance Performer

Yet, the one aspect of Henderson’s game that was as evident as any stats we could put forth today was, of course, the manner in which he grew into the game and despite Swansea’s best attempts to continuously drag themselves back into the match, it was Liverpool’s cold desire to ensure all three points that ultimately won out – a observation best illustrated through their star midfielder.

Such an ability to raise his game is what makes Henderson such a key player for Liverpool. As we can see from the graph above showing his performance scores throughout the match, the burst in effort after the 15th minute and in the last 10 minutes were invaluable to his side having picked up all three points on the day. This is why he was so excellent against Swansea and one of Liverpool’s top players.