VICTOR BONIFACE: Leverkusen boss Alonso makes you 'up your game'

Bayer Leverkusen and Nigeria striker Victor Boniface said Xabi Alonso has a particular advantage over other coaches on the training pitch.

"Imagine you're training and your coach is doing better than you," Boniface told AFP in an interview.

"Then you want to step up your game.

"For him to be involved in training gives us a boost," Boniface said of Alonso, who "has won everything that can be won in football".

"Sometimes he tells me of players he played with, with similar abilities to me. He tries to improve me in my weakest areas."

Leverkusen host third-placed Stuttgart on Saturday knowing they are four games away from becoming the first team to go through a Bundesliga season unbeaten.

Their runs to the German Cup final, where they face second-division Kaiserslautern, and Europa League semifinals, where they take on Roma, mean they have gone a record 45 games unbeaten in all competitions this season.

'I LOVE PENALTIES' 

Boniface, 23, was born in the southern Nigerian city of Akure and told AFP he was "always" a football fan.

Earlier this month, he coolly dispatched a penalty to open the scoring in the 5-0 home rout of Werder Bremen which made Leverkusen Bundesliga champions for the first time.

Leverkusen had never previously won a league title in their 120-year history.

The club's record of second-placed finishes – often somehow snatching defeat from the jaws of victory – saw them tainted with the unwanted 'Neverkusen' moniker, but Boniface said he was not nervous when he took the spot-kick.

"No. To be honest, I didn't feel pressure. We're football players.

"Moments like this – I took the responsibility to help the team. That's why I'm here. I love penalties."

The pressure of a spot-kick pales in comparison with some of the struggles