Virgil van Dijk: We need to be at 100 per cent, nothing less
Virgil van Dijk has outlined why Liverpool will not be underestimating Red Star Belgrade when they meet in the Champions League on Wednesday night, insisting they ‘will need to be at 100 per cent’ in order to claim a victory.
The Reds suffered a setback in their last outing in the tournament, with a last-minute goal condemning them to a 1-0 defeat to Napoli in Italy.
Jürgen Klopp’s side will aim to get their qualification aspirations back on track at Anfield tomorrow, but Van Dijk has warned of the threat of their opponents.
“They are in the Champions League - the best competition in Europe apart from the Premier League - and it will be a hard game,” he said. “We will need to be 100 per cent and I think we will be.
“Against Huddersfield, we should have done even better. Obviously we kept a clean sheet, which is all good, but we could have made it easier for ourselves.
“We need to win every game. There is basically no other mindset.
“It’s another Champions League night at Anfield and I’m sure we will recover from Huddersfield and make sure we are ready.”
Liverpool ground out a 1-0 victory at Huddersfield Town last time out, with Mohamed Salah’s first-half goal the difference at the John Smith’s Stadium.
The Reds were forced to thwart sustained pressure from the hosts as they claimed the three points – and Van Dijk feels the clean sheet can be taken as a positive, though acknowledges there is room for improvement.
He continued: “You are not going to dominate every game and play well every game but considering how we played it was a great result to keep a clean sheet.
“That's all good but we could have done a bit better, perhaps made it easier for ourselves.
“At times they [Huddersfield] made it look more dangerous than it really was and they had their moments where if they did a little better they could have scored.”