Liverpool suffered a tough defeat at Anfield on Sunday, as Harry Maguire’s late header snatched all three points in the Premier League clash.
Liverpool found themselves behind just 62 seconds in after Bryan Mbeumo struck early for the visitors, but Cody Gakpo brought the Reds level with a well-taken goal in the second half.
Van Dijk shared his thoughts with Sky Sports after the match, breaking down the game and explaining why he felt Liverpool fell short against Manchester United at Anfield.
“Because we conceded a very sloppy second goal. We worked so hard to get back into the game, and we created opportunities to score the winner, but if you concede a second goal like that, obviously that’s the disappointing part. I think overall if you look at the game, we were far too rushed. I think we were making wrong decisions, and they were also the moments where we were open if we lost the ball. Yeah, a disappointing day.”
“I think United were obviously very patient. They didn’t press us that high, and they let us have the ball. I think we made rash decisions at times when we had to stay maybe a little bit calm. We still created many opportunities to score and win the game. But the reality is that we lost. It’s an interesting time now, and we have to stick together – not only us as players but also together with our fans and everyone who wants us to win.”
He also spoke about Mbeumo’s opening goal, which came just 65 seconds into the game, admitting it was a tough start that put Liverpool immediately on the back foot.
“I think the ball goes long, the first header gets won by a United player, the second header won by me, in that moment obviously I hit Macca [Alexis Mac Allister], he goes down, I go down and that creates the space on my position in behind. I thought from the angle that it was pretty difficult to score but he managed to score. It’s still early on in the game, so there’s still plenty of football to be played. It was good for us to just stay calm but I think we didn’t manage that in the best way and that’s obviously disappointing.”
Van Dijk wrapped up by explaining what the team needs to do to move past their rough patch and get back to winning ways, after suffering four consecutive defeats for the first time in a long while.
“First and foremost, stay humble and stay working and try to keep your confidence as high as possible, because when you lose, your confidence could drop a little bit. But it’s about staying very calm. We’ve been coming from a season where everything was unbelievable and everyone was praising everyone, positive and we became the champions and everyone was cheering for us as well. When things get tough, it’s important that we keep that same mentality of being there for each other.”
“It’s still a long season. Obviously it’s easy to get dragged into a negative spiral but it’s down to us to keep working, stay humble and improve as soon as possible and, when you get the opportunity, to show your quality and win your games. I mentioned it already before, you have to put things in perspective – we’re in October now, so many twists and turns can happen. But the reality is we come off four defeats in a row now and we want to turn it around as soon as possible.”
