Thierry Henry: ‘Even watching Liverpool makes me tired’
Arsenal’s all-time top-scorer, Thierry Henry, confessed that watching Liverpool wears him out while discussing the current intensity in England’s top division.
Jurgen Klopp’s men are running away with this season’s Premier League title, having won 26 of their opening 27 matches and drawing the other away to rivals Manchester United.
Five things to know about Liverpool’s record-breaking form…
- Liverpool are 22 points clear at the top of the table and need just four more wins to clinch their first domestic title since 1990
- The earliest-ever Premier League title win is April 21 (Man Utd, 2001) and Liverpool have at least six top-flight fixtures before that date passes.
- At one point Liverpool held a 25-point lead, the biggest ever in English top-flight history.
- Jurgen Klopp’s men equalled Man City’s record of 18 consecutive Premier League wins by beating West Ham on Monday evening.
- They could finish the current campaign with a maximum 112 points, which would be the best three-point-season record of any division in English football history
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The Reds recently survived a scare at home going 2-1 down to West Ham and are on course to follow Preston North End (1888/89) and Arsenal (2003/04) in completing an entire English top-flight season without a single loss.
One cornerstone of their success has been Klopp’s implementation of his fast-paced counter-pressing style, which brought him incredible success at Borussia Dortmund. Most notably, the BVB won back-to-back Bundesliga titles under Klopp and reached a Champions League final.
It goes without saying Liverpool are playing at a level of fitness very few teams are able to live with. Klopp’s concerted coaching efforts in achieving this are no secret. As former Reds midfielder Emre Can revealed in 2016: “I remember [Klopp] saying in pre-season that the target was to be the fittest team in the league.”
Elsewhere, following a 3-1 defeat that got him sacked as Manchester United manager in 2017, Jose Mourinho observed: “They play 200 miles per hour with and without the ball. I am still tired just looking at [Andy] Robertson. He makes 100-metre sprints every minute, absolutely incredible.”
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Henry, a multiple Premier League winner, echoed Mourinho’s assessment while underlining how the intensity of their domestic league is on another level compared to other major leagues.
“The intensity, the rhythm that you have in the Premier League, it’s very high,” he told Canal+.
“You see, when you watch Liverpool, even just watching them, you get tired. They move so quickly.”
Henry feels the Premier League, on the whole, is a hub of fine-tuned athleticism.
He continued: “When you go to Manchester City, before you have even looked up, there is pressing on you.
“If you control the ball, there are already three guys around you. The Premier League’s intensity is immense.”
Liverpool have Watford next in the Premier League this Saturday, a day before Man City play Aston Villa in the EFL Cup final. If City win at Wembley, they will move to within one more trophy shy of equalling the current record for the most League Cup wins. In a reversal of one of this season’s major themes, the record they are chasing down – which currently stands at eight – belongs to Liverpool.
