InterviewVirgil van Dijk on Rangers win, Reds' spirit and upcoming tests
Virgil van Dijk was satisfied with Liverpool's performance as they returned to winning ways by beating Rangers 2-0 at Anfield.
Tuesday night’s Champions League match was settled by Trent Alexander-Arnold’s sensational early free-kick and a second-half penalty from Mohamed Salah.
The Reds sit second in Group A on six points ahead of next week’s reverse fixture at Ibrox, a game that follows the weekend trip to Arsenal in the Premier League.
Post-match, Liverpoolfc.com spoke to Van Dijk – read the interview with the No.4 below…
Extended highlights: Liverpool 2-0 Rangers
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On how pleased he is with the performance and result…
Yeah, pleased. Three points, overall a very good performance and a lot of things that we wanted to do came out. We created a lot of chances, I think their goalkeeper was outstanding, kept them in the game and yeah, I think overall it was very important to gain confidence and keep the clean sheet and do very well. I think we did.
On Liverpool working well as a team…
Yeah. You know, when you are in a difficult moment everyone wants to sort the situation out as quickly as possible and that’s not always easy. You want to sort it like today or tomorrow and get everything as good as possible again because the consistency we showed over the last four or five years, that’s something that is the most difficult part in football and if you are not doing it right now then obviously you get the criticism that you deserve. But it’s also a little bit that we set the standards so high that we know we are under some pressure. That’s why we have to stick together, be there for each other, work even harder and you see today great spirit in each and every one of us and [it was] a well-deserved win.
On how pleased he is for Alexander-Arnold to have delivered a superb opening goal…
Yeah, you know, that’s the outside world [discussing Alexander-Arnold]. Obviously the criticism we all got could have happened but for him he just had to keep his head down. He showed today his quality again and defensively he was there as well. Hopefully we can keep that line going, all of us, and keep clean sheets.
On next week’s trip to Ibrox and whether he is expecting a hostile reception given his Celtic connections…
The last time I got booed was when I played England in Portugal in the Nations League semi-final and we won, so hopefully if that’s the case and we win then I will have it! But I don’t get affected by it, I try to play my best game and in order to do that the focus should be 100 per cent there. We know it’s going to be very tough over there with the fans so we have to be ready, but first we’ve got another big challenge coming up in the capital.
