England striker Rhian Brewster is enjoying his experience at the U17 World Cup this month and the Liverpool striker gives us his thoughts and an update from the Young Lions camp in India.
It’s been a great trip so far, and one that I’ve loved every minute of since we first got here a few weeks ago.
You don’t play in World Cups every day and I’d been looking forward to it for ages, ever since we qualified last May, and now it’s come around I’ve enjoyed it a lot.
India has been great too. It’s a lot different to England, where we take things for granted. We’ve been treated like kings when we’ve been here and it’s been a lovely welcome. Everyone has been so friendly and I haven’t seen one person being bad towards us.
The games have been unbelievable too. I’ve never played in front of that many fans before like what we had in Kolkata, so it’s been unbelievable really. We just don’t want it to end now.
I’m learning so much here, it’s big tournament football and you’re not going to play in many in your career at any level. It could be your first and last, so you’ve got to make the most of it.
And having played in front of the big crowds here, if I go back and do it again with Liverpool, it shouldn’t be such a big thing as we’ve done it already here.
Looking back at the last game, to beat Japan, and score five penalties out of five in a shootout, was great for us.
We were disappointed not to score in the game, as we usually always score goals. And people might have thought we played badly, but if you look back at the game, we didn’t play badly at all, we played well really. We kept a clean sheet, so we proved we can defend well too, we just couldn’t get the goal.
My best moment so has been the free-kick against Mexico. Well, after I’d missed a sitter in the first half, I had to make up for it. So when we got the free-kick, I looked at it and I just thought I’d hit it towards the top corner and thankfully it came off so it’s one for the collection.
We’ve moved on to Goa now, and it came at a good time really. We’d been in Kolkata for a relatively long time so to come to a new place and a nice hotel, it’s put a bit of a spring back in our step and everyone’s looking forward to it now.
It’s relaxed here and we all feel good about the game, I don’t feel nervous about it, I think if we go and play our normal game, we can keep going.
As for my own story back home, I obviously play for Liverpool but I’m a London boy originally.
I was 14 when I first moved to Liverpool from Chelsea, to play for the U15s at first. I like it there too, it’s completely different to London and it’s a lot quieter.
London’s so hectic, with people always moving around, but maybe it’s good to have a quieter life there. I’m in digs at the moment and I’m enjoying life.
I get on with my team-mates at Liverpool and when I’ve trained with the first team, they’ve always welcomed me and it’s been good.
I’ve trained with Jurgen Klopp a few times and he’s a real character. He’s been good and happy towards me, so I’m hoping to prove that when I go back, as well as at this tournament, I can be with the first team.
But for now, we have USA on Saturday and that’s where all of our focus is.
