Steven Gerrard set to join England’s exclusive 100 Club

Assuming his knee holds up, longtime Liverpool and England international midfielder Steven Gerrard is about to collect his 100^th cap for country.

If Gerrard gets on the field during Wednesday’s friendly against Sweden in Stockholm, he will become sixth England man to gain that celebrated 100^th international appearance. (All signs indicated the slight knee strain picked up over the weekend against Chelsea will not keep Gerrard from reaching No. 100.)

It’s quite an exclusive club. The short list is:

• Peter Shilton, 125
• David Beckham, 115
• Bobby Moore, 108
• Bobby Charlton, 106
• Billy Wright, 105

In case you don’t know what those nice young fellows looked like, here’s a short little pictorial walk through the list.

Gerrard first stepped on the field for England back in May of 2000. There are surely a couple of young men or women out there reading this who were not alive at the time. That was a 2-0 win for the Three Lions over Ukraine under then-manager Kevin Keegan.

Here’s what Robbie Fowler says about Gerrard reaching such a meaningful, hard-to-achieve milepost:

It’s a well-deserved honour for him to get to 100 caps. He’s been Liverpool’s best player for many, many years, and alongside John Terry I’d say he’s been England best over the same period.

“He should have been England’s captain a long, long time ago. He can come across to people who don’t know as a bit surly at times, but he’s the perfect captain for his club and his country.

“He controls that dressing room, and looks after his team-mates the way you would want a captain to.”