Van Dijk

How Trent Alexander-Arnold Has Become Klopp’s de Bruyne

No, for the love of God, Trent Alexander-Arnold is not as good as Kevin de Bruyne. Just examine the radar below, courtesy of understat.com, for evidence of that. Kevin de Bruyne, under Pep Guardiola, is a phenomenon, involved in everything Manchester City do on a football pitch. Without him, as evidenced by the performance...

Player Ratings as Liverpool Topple Leicester City

The Reds keep marching on after a dramatic 95th-minute penalty from James Milner sealed all 3 points. Liverpool should have had the game wrapped up much earlier but wasted a number of opportunities, allowing Leicester the chance to level late on. However, it was a thoroughly deserved win which will undoubtedly boil the piss of...

Salzburg rollercoaster provides timely reality check for Liverpool

I must admit, I feel a bit daft. It was only recently that I wrote something, somewhere about how Liverpool's players are the epitome of the mentality monsters that Jürgen Klopp christened them as only last season. While that's still not so far from the truth, the Reds certainly have reason to believe that they are...

Liverpool Survive Scare in Anfield Goal Bonanza

A Mohamed Salah brace and goals from Sadio Mané and Andrew Robertson saw Liverpool clinch a 4-3 win over Red Bull Salzburg in an Anfield goal bonanza. The defending champions raced into a three goal lead, thanks to goals from Mane, Robertson and Salah. But the Jesse Marsch coached Austrian side managed to claw the...

Player Ratings as Liverpool best Chelsea at the Bridge

Six in a row, 15 in a row, five points clear and all the jazz that comes with it. 'Lucky Liverpool' were at it again, the whole winning thing, at Stamford Bridge on Sunday. First-half goals from Trent Alexander-Arnold and Roberto Firmino giving the Reds enough room to hold off a Chelsea fightback in the...

Why Virgil Van Dijk is better than Sergio Ramos

Twitter can be a strange place. In the past, it was a place to share opinions. Now the majority use it as a platform to ridicule them. Football Twitter has seeped into normal, everyday Twitter. People want to either trigger you or they stick on a mask and start looking for easy retweets and...

Napoli 2-0 Liverpool: What went wrong?

This is the second year in succession that I'm sitting down to ponder how Liverpool were beaten at the Stadio San Paolo, but the circumstances feel different. Last season, it was more or less a case of a wretched team performance, but on the whole the Reds turned in a decent display at this time,...

Reds Rue Referee Replay Refusal in Reversal

A contentious Dries Mertens penalty and a late Fernando Llorente goal saw Liverpool start their European Cup defence start with a 2-0 defeat to Napoli in Italy. Jurgen Klopp made three alterations to the team that defeated Newcastle on Saturday, with James Milner and Jordan Henderson returning to the midfield in place of Georginio Wijnaldum...

Liverpool 3-1 Newcastle: A Tactical Breakdown

International breaks can often pose a challenge for teams on a winning streak, with an unnecessary interruption to the rhythm of the side. Against Newcastle, for the opening 15-20 minutes at least, it seemed that was the case. Newcastle opted to launch balls into the wide channels, and fight for second balls, but it...

Is Van Dijk the Premier League’s best-ever centre-back?

Has a Liverpool player ever received as much endless praise over a sustained period than Virgil van Dijk? The Dutchman has been an almost godlike figure at Anfield from the moment he arrived in January 2018, powering home a header in front of the Kop on his debut, against Everton no less. Since then, Van Dijk...