£75m Liverpool player admits he really wasn’t happy with his form last season

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Liverpool’s form from last season to this season really couldn’t be much more different.

Having failed to launch completely during 2022/23, the Reds had a campaign to forget. Trophy-less and fifth in the Premier League, it was a low point of Jurgen Klopp’s glittering reign so far.

Amongst the wreckage, there were few Liverpool players to come out of the season with much credit at all. And some, like Virgil van Dijk, were openly questioned whether their best days were now behind them.

This season, those same players have answered their critics emphatically. And none have hit back as hard as Van Dijk. Now the Liverpool captain, the 32-year-old has been supreme from day one of the campaign.

From Virgil’s own personal point of view, that’s just as well. Speaking to Dutch outlet de Volkskrant while away with the national team this week, the centre-back claimed that he is back to form, and made a ‘disappointing’ admission about last season.

“I feel really good, let’s keep it that way,” Van Dijk said. “I wasn’t used to not being at a consistent level, and the team couldn’t always rely on me [last season]. That was very disappointing for me.”

Van Dijk admits form disappointment

During the interview back in his homeland this week, Van Dijk touched upon the knee injury he suffered three years ago now.

It seems that having spent almost a year out injured, the affects of that reckless challenge from Jordan Pickford were still being felt last season.

“It takes a while to get used to your new knee,” says the £75m defender. “You have to recover from that. You have to get used to it. Hard work in the gym. There’s so much to it.

“You have to deal with the flexibility, with the bending, and with the stretch. If your stretch isn’t good, you won’t be able to bend properly and you won’t be able to sprint properly. I worked a lot on that. That takes time, with a lot of treatments, even outside of training and competitions.”

Initially, during the 2021/22 season, Van Dijk looked to have recovered well from the time out. But with Liverpool in good form and going for a quadruple, perhaps the slight deficiencies the injury opened up were masked by those around him.

Last year, there was simply nowhere to hide. Virgil had the odd performance of old, but by and large he looked uncomfortable.

Now, with Liverpool going much better, the Netherlands international once again looks like exactly what he is: one of if not the best defender in the world.

It’s been a long old road for Virg, and there’s still a way to go for him to prove that he is well and truly back. But the signs so far are fantastic. Given what he’s done for the Reds, Van Dijk was allowed an off-colour season and then some. Great to have him firing again.