Daniel Sturridge focussed on Liverpool Champions League celebrations as he remains coy on future

Liverpool FC via Getty Images
David Lynch3 June 2019

Daniel Sturridge brought the curtain down on his Liverpool career with Champions League victory in Madrid.

And the Englishman was keen to soak up every moment of that historic success at full-time, rather than talk about his uncertain future.

After six-and-a-half seasons, 160 appearances, and 67 goals, Sturridge will depart Anfield when his contract expires this summer.

But there was no big reveal of the 29-year-old's plans for next season following the Reds' 2-0 win over Tottenham, with the subsequent celebrations at the forefront of his mind instead.

"What is next? Going to this party. We’re going to drink, we’re going to have fun, we’re going to celebrate, and then tomorrow we’ve got the bus ride," he said.

"That’s all I’m thinking about, man. It’s been a great day for everybody so we’re just going to celebrate and have fun.

"I don’t even want to talk about all that stuff. I feel like it has been an incredible time and I am not going to talk about next season or anything.

"What’s important now is celebrating something so momentous, something we were striving for, working for for a long time. to finally win something is amazing."

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Saturday's game marked the fourth occasion Sturridge had been involved in a final since joining Liverpool, with the previous three having all ended in defeat.

One of those was the Europa League showpiece against Sevilla in 2016, which saw a half-time lead brought about by the striker's brilliant opener turn into a 3-1 loss.

And the lessons taken from that experience ensured there was no chance of a repeat when the Reds took the same lead into the break against Spurs.

Sturridge explained: "The heartache never goes away: you always think about it. People were saying ‘if we win we won’t think about it’ but you do [after losing].

"You always think, ‘what if? what could we have done differently, how can we prepare differently?’ There are so many different questions that you ask yourself.

"All the things when you lost, you take them into a game because you’ve learnt from them: all the pain, all the heartache you had prior to that. And when you come into a game like this, you go: ‘Okay, cool’.

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"You come in at half-time and you talk different. You’re like: ‘Remember what happened last time guys. Let’s do this. When we come out at half time… we prepare ourselves like this is we are in front.’

"We had meetings as a group of players in the week. We said: ‘If we go one up how do we play? If we go one down how do we play?’ It’s about being prepared for everything.

"I’m looking from the outside and I’m thinking these are certain things we need to do differently. And when we got in at half-time everyone started speaking about how they felt we needed to improve for the second half."

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