NewsVirgil van Dijk offers in-depth insight on his approach to defending

The Netherlands international recently spoke to retired goalkeeper Ben Foster via Amazon Prime Video and delved into the approach to the craft that has taken him to the heights of the game.

Van Dijk has, of course, lifted multiple major honours – including the Premier League and Champions League – since joining the Reds in January 2018 and most recently led the team to Carabao Cup success earlier this year.

Read a summary of Van Dijk’s chat with Foster below…

On his personal approach to one-on-one defending against strikers…

Eventually when you’re one-on-one, you want to give him a side to go to. But if he then eventually goes to that side, you have to take him. But when you play against world-class strikers and you try to do that, still try to block it – it’s not like I want to give him a shot – but because obviously you play against world-class strikers, they could get a shot. You have to try to limit the power, you have to try to limit the accuracy with your body position, with strength and delaying that moment as well. I think if you step in too quickly, you give the opportunity to make a decision, and that’s not something I really stand for. It’s basically trusting your own defensive qualities.

On how he deals with defending the ‘corridor of uncertainty’…

Communication is massive. If the cross comes in and Ali [Alisson Becker] is shouting then I have one job only: trying to protect him and making sure that he doesn’t get pressure from any direction. Obviously I can only do so much but that’s how it is. If he doesn’t shout anything then I have to make sure that I’m in the right body position to clear the ball. It’s a difficult one, because you only have to clear it and flip it or whatever and it goes in your own goal. That’s a situation where you have to be very concentrated.

Maybe [experience helps] because when there is a one-v-one on the side or a moment of the full-back coming through, you know there is a cross coming in so you have to try to position your body in the right way in order to clear the ball. That doesn’t guarantee that you’ll be able to clear it perfectly, because it can still go left, right, own goal that no-one is hoping for. Because you have no idea how the cross will be; the cross can also be half-height, it can be driven in. So it’s difficult to adjust to that anyway but I think it’s the communication and your body position. It’s a very good name [corridor of uncertainty].

On his relationship with Alisson and how nice it is to have him as the last line of defence…

It’s nice. I want him to not have anything to do! That’s my personal feeling. But obviously we play at the highest level, we’re playing against good teams and good strikers, and there could be moments that he has to do his job. And I’m very, very happy that he’s very good at this job as well. Him, me and the rest of our defenders, we live and dream of clean sheets and that’s what we aim for. My relationship with him since the moment he walked into the club has been special. We have played so many games together, we won everything together and he is an incredible goalkeeper and incredible human being as well.

On how much communication there is between them during games…

Yeah, he is communicating to me a lot, I do the same to him. And obviously to the rest of the team, but that’s something else. It’s the small details; body position in possession, where he positions himself, obviously if he needs me to do certain things. Corners, for example, how we defend and organisation. It’s all small things but they make a massive difference in order to hopefully get the win and clean sheet. He is, in my eyes, the best goalie in the world.

On developing his ability to play out from the back during his career…

Obviously that grew over the years. Obviously in Holland, for example, we have definitely been growing up and doing a lot of possession games and passing exercises and stuff. Actually, building up wasn’t really a strength of mine, if I’m absolutely honest. But I obviously grew into that. I think it wasn’t really a strength of mine because I was never playing, up until Celtic, for a club that was always dominant and always won games. It was always a bit a struggle. But at Celtic we had 70 per cent of the ball during the game, and there’s different demands and different things that will happen. At Southampton, working with [Ronald] Koeman was a big, big step for me and learning a lot. I grew into that. And obviously at Liverpool it speaks for itself.

On acting as a mentor to fellow Reds centre-back Jarell Quansah…

A hundred per cent. But that isn’t only because he’s young, I could also say that over the last couple of years about [Joel] Matip or about Joe Gomez or [Ibrahima] Konate. I’m always communicating, I’m always shouting. If you would ask them how many times I shout their names during the games, they would get sick of me! But it’s only because we have one goal: trying not to concede. And the organisation has to be solid to get obviously the two centre-halves and the No.6, that’s the defensive structure that we have. And the rest can do whatever they want and score goals. In this case with Jarell, I’m definitely in his ear all the time. Even outside the pitch and before training; if we have a tactical session of a game and we play against players he has never played against – he’s seen them on TV – I will definitely speak about what they’re good at, what they normally do, what they do in the game, how they approach you maybe, what they try to do to get in your head. Things like that, small bits that can help him. Anything in order to not lose the game.