JORDAN HENDERSON was already heading for the Footballer of the Year award.
As captain of the most dominant team the English game has ever seen, the Liverpool midfielder’s on-field leadership made him the outstanding candidate.
Yet Henderson has performed a far more worthy act of leadership by holding talks with all his rival Premier League captains to set up a coronavirus crisis fund.
It could raise millions for the NHS — and would be of more direct help than the 30 per cent wage cuts or deferrals being demanded by clubs as money would go straight to the frontline.
Henderson held talks with fellow skippers this week, well before health secretary Matt Hancock called out top-flight footballers for failing to do their bit.
Premier League stars are finally beginning to restore reputations which had become tarnished by an apparent lack of willingness to help society.
Footballers are always easy targets, of course. Young, high-profile working-class men with money will always get it in the neck, far more so than privately-educated bankers and hedge-fund bosses.
Even though footballers earn their status in a highly-competitive meritocracy, while many in the finance sector gain vast salaries by virtue of old-school ties.
But footballers already knew they were sitting ducks — which only increased the need for good PR.
Because when the only argument against players contributing to the greater good is ‘whataboutery’ — ‘what about all the other millionaires? — then, really, there is no true argument at all.
Footballers needed to show willing, just to be true to themselves.
Henderson, like most Premier League captains and indeed most footballers, is certainly not selfish and greedy.
It is just a lack of moral leadership from the PFA players’ union — who refuse to sanction blanket pay cuts — had started to make them look that way.
You would like to say the whole debacle will have hastened the departure of the PFA’s 75-year-old chief executive Gordon Taylor.
But given that he promised to quit a year ago, it’s a little late in the day for hasty exits.
When the issue of pay cuts was first mooted, there was a deafening silence from the PFA.
Players were determined to show solidarity, rather than acting individually — with Taylor even claiming they didn’t want to make fellow professionals ‘feel uncomfortable’ by performing good deeds.
Prioritising the feelings of those not willing to contribute over the need to show charitable instincts was not a good look.
Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy attempted to publicly shame players into agreeing cuts on Tuesday.
But only as he applied for Government money to pay his club’s non-playing staff on the very day his own £7m annual earnings were revealed.
It all added to an image of Premier League football as a greedy, selfish and morally bankrupt environment. Without a PFA chief willing to look out for wider society, players needed someone to stand up and be counted — and Henderson did so.
Henderson says he isn’t seeking personal credit for the initiative and we should take his word for that, because o the Mackem is a modest and decent man.
But he will get fulsome praise all the same — and the other captains who unanimously backed him deserve credit, too.
Although Henderson’s call to Aston Villa’s captain Jack Grealish might have been one of his more interesting and hopefully Grealish didn’t suggest having the other 19 skippers round for a few jars.
Over the past few seasons, Henderson has become an increasingly-impressive leader for club and country.
For while Harry Kane wears England’s armband, Hendo is the team’s most vocal on-field presence.
As captain of a team who could yet be denied a title they were nailed-on to win before the lockdown, Henderson had better reason than most to feel sorry for himself.
Yet the Liverpool skipper showed only concern for others at a time of unprecedented crisis.
