Hernandez: I needed first-team football

Javier Hernandez: Linked with Liverpool switch

Javier Hernandez: Linked with Liverpool switch

Javier Hernandez says his red-hot goalscoring form is down the “rhythm” he has built up from playing regular first-team football.

Hernandez left Manchester United for Bayer Leverkusen for £7.3million in the summer after United boss Louis van Gaal claimed he could not offer the Mexico striker the game time he required.

The 27-year-old has since scored 19 goals in 22 games for the Bundesliga side and he has already been linked with move away from the German club with Arsenal rumoured to be interested in him.

Explaining his upturn in form since leaving Old Trafford, the Guadalajara-born frontman believes regular playing opportunities has been crucial.

“What I was missing in the last two or three years, it was like I was playing sometimes and then returning to the bench,” Hernandez told the Orlando Sentinel.

“But now that I am playing most of the game or almost all of my games here in my club, that’s what I need.

“Because people sometimes think the confidence is with goals, but I don’t think like that. I think confidence is to play day-by-day, to get rhythm.”