The Virgil van Dijk Paradox: A legend at Liverpool, divisive in the Netherlands

June 29, 2024

In the good old days, when nobody could beat him, Virgil van Dijk quietly wondered about the accuracy of the repeated claim that he was impassable.

It seemed to him that opponents lost focus as they tried to prove the notion wrong, or simply gave up altogether. Certainly, when they started trying again, albeit with more confidence after he sustained a knee injury that could have ended his career, it led to easy claims that he was in decline.

The data, nevertheless, is stark. Between 2018 and 2020, when Liverpool won Champions League and Premier League titles in successive seasons, there were 54 attempts to dribble past him and only one player made it out the other side. In the next three seasons, overwhelmingly post injury, 23 of 89 dribbling attempts were successful.

Yet the stats alone cannot be considered definitive: Van Dijk’s teammates have given him less protection, while personnel and tactics have changed significantly.

This season Van Dijk has played in 10 Premier League matches, facing 13 dribbling attempts, with none succeeding. He also tops the Opta lists for tackles won and duels in the air.

With a re-styled Liverpool improving, he seems to be returning to something close to his best form, an uplift which has coincided with him being appointed as captain by Jurgen Klopp in the summer.

Virgil van Dijk has been back to his best at Liverpool (Alex Livesey/Getty Images)

He assumed the same responsibility with the Dutch national team in 2018, but while his status on Merseyside is virtually untouchable, at home the conversation is rather different. Since 2022, for a few of the most outspoken pundits in the country at least, Van Dijk has become a lightning rod for the Netherlands’ supposed failings.

A popular Chinese proverb in the Netherlands is, “the higher the tree, the stronger the wind.” In football terms, this has equated to Van Dijk receiving the most criticism. Supposedly, it doesn’t overly affect him — he accepts that it goes with the territory and is conscious that even the country’s most famous footballer, Johan Cruyff, was not immune.

Though a victory over the Republic of Ireland in Amsterdam on Saturday night will secure qualification for next summer’s European Championship, the Netherlands’ position in the tournament would have been in doubt had Van Dijk not scored an injury-time penalty in Greece last month.

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Earlier in that game, Wout Weghorst, formerly with Burnley and Manchester United, had missed another spot kick. Van Dijk’s willingness to step up demonstrated some of the skills he has been accused of lacking, particularly by Marco van Basten, the legendary Dutch striker, who works as a pundit for pay-TV channel Ziggo Sport.

Van Basten had been critical of Van Dijk before his injury but nobody really listened to him then. With Liverpool games broadcast more often in the campaign after he returned to the team, there was more opportunity for discussion about his performances because of the sheer number of big games Liverpool contested, as Klopp’s side attempted to win an unprecedented Quadruple.

In April 2022, Van Basten spoke about the player’s development, acknowledging his rise from a defender that none of the top Dutch clubs really wanted to one who was arguably the best in European football. Van Dijk was “definitely at the top now,” Van Basten concluded before describing him as a “grandiose defender and a grandiose player.”

“He’s fast, he can head well, he has good passing, good technique,” he added.

Yet he also felt there were areas for improvement, particularly his “presence”. Van Dijk, he said, needed to contribute more in the attacking phase of play by “using possession quicker,” affecting the midfield by moving the ball forward “in the right way.”

Marco van Basten has been a critic of Virgil van Dijk (Claudio Villa/Getty Images)

“I think he can do much more, he often limits himself to playing the ball to his full-backs, but he has a great pass in him,” Van Basten added. “He can dribble in; he has good technique to do it. He can be much more dominant.”

Then, in September 2022, after Van Dijk helped seal qualification for the Nations League finals by contributing towards two clean sheets in victories over Poland and Belgium (scoring the winner in the latter), Van Basten shifted gears.

Van Dijk did “the least in terms of initiative,” with Van Basten adding that “it is very strange that such a good player does so little for the national team in the build-up.”

In the World Cup that followed, an unfancied Dutch team, led by Louis van Gaal, progressed to the quarter-finals and were unfortunate in losing to eventual champions Argentina in a penalty shootout.

Not that Van Basten was impressed. The former Ajax and Milan forward was working for NOS, Dutch state television, during the competition, so his criticisms had more traction with a wider audience. After some especially pointed words following a 1-1 group stage draw with Ecuador, Van Dijk finally bit back: “I don’t think he’s ever really positive, so what should I do with him?”

Van Dijk regretted taking the bait, later reasoning that he was “only human” and “triggered” moments after leaving the pitch. Van Gaal defended his captain by describing him as a “fantastic” leader.

Fundamentally, Van Basten wanted to see Van Dijk take on more responsibility with the ball by playing like some of the legends he’d played with or watched. From the back, Frank Rijkaard, Ronald Koeman and Frank de Boer were able to dictate the way the national team played. In the true spirit of Dutch football, where hierarchies have often been ignored, it seemed as though Van Basten wanted the defender to be more forceful with his manager, or dare to go his own way – as Cruyff was able to.

Virgil van Dijk has a different role with the Dutch side (Koen van Weel/ANP/AFP via Getty Images)

Yet arguably, Van Gaal was the first Dutch coach to successfully create a culture where the manager’s rule was total. Van Dijk tried to explain that he was issued with a different role because Van Gaal operated with a back three, a shape he was comfortable with. He was in the centre of that, and the two players either side of him were able to be more expressive. “I often have the rush hour ahead of me and I am the lock on the door,” Van Dijk reasoned.

Van Basten’s comments had paid little attention to what the player was being asked to do, both at international level and at his club. Given Liverpool’s success under Klopp, it would have been somewhat selfish of Van Dijk had he challenged the manager over style issues. If he wanted to play, as he sometimes did at Celtic, for example, by striding forward and scoring spectacular goals, then it could be interpreted that he showed leadership by curbing those instincts for the betterment of those around him.

At Anfield, Van Dijk has always been the ball-playing centre-back but he has never been expected to join the midfield. While he regularly used his passing range to switch play from his position on the left side of the defence, it has been his job to cover the other centre-back, who has more freedom to drive forward, as well as both full-backs, who have long had attacking responsibilities. Van Dijk’s pace often proved to be Liverpool’s cheat code when other teams exploited any overload.

After the World Cup, Van Dijk was targeted again, this time after a 4-0 defeat in France during European Championship qualifying, where three goals were conceded inside the opening 21 minutes.

“He makes noise, but doesn’t say anything,” Van Basten said. “A good captain makes it clear what is going on. He creates chaos that leads to misunderstandings. That is what you, as captain, must prevent.”

Ruud Gullit piled in with his own observations, suggesting flatly: “He thinks he’s better than the rest…”

Like when it was claimed that nobody could dribble past him, these opinions from hugely successful and respected figures were presented as fact, greatly influencing general opinion.

This, however, had already started to change in 2020 because of a boycott led by the captains of the men’s and women’s senior teams, aimed at Veronica Inside, a prominent Dutch TV show presented by Johan Derksen, a former professional footballer who had developed a provocative reputation.

Johan Derksen has become a controversial presence on Dutch TV (VI Images via Getty Images)

The move was prompted by Derksen comparing a Dutch rapper and activist to “Black Pete,” a fictional character in Dutch winter holiday celebrations usually portrayed by white people wearing face paint. He had previously compared a Surinamese-born politician to a monkey and claimed that the standard of amateur football in the Netherlands was being threatened by an increase of players with Moroccan heritage. “I will be dismissed as a racist but I really don’t give a damn,” he said at the time.

In 2020, Derksen thought his comments were a “storm in a teacup that will blow over,” but it divided the country for years and, Van Dijk, along with his teammates, was a significant part of that conversation. “This is not on the edge, this has nothing to do with humour, this is not the language of football,” he said.

Whereas he was initially an overwhelmingly popular captain, Van Dijk entering a debate about racism — or, according to Derksen and his supporters, free speech — meant there was now a section of Dutch society potentially in opposition to him.

Reporters would continue to show up at the press conferences of the Dutch national team but they were not allowed to ask questions. Before last year’s World Cup, it was suggested that the country’s footballers — with Van Dijk leading them — could have taken more of a stance about the tournament being hosted in a country with a poor human rights record but chose not to.

Amid all of this, there has been the injury that kept him out of football for almost 300 days, and the subsequent belief, more so in the Netherlands than at Liverpool, whose fans sing about him being “as calm as you like,” that he has not been able to get back to his previous levels.

Virgil van Dijk is hugely popular with Liverpool fans (Yong Teck Lim/Getty Images)

The evidence suggests that he is, though. Van Dijk has not had a single problem with his knee since returning to football in 2021. He doesn’t have fluid on it, he doesn’t need it to be drained or have ice applied to it. Inwardly, he doesn’t feel as though he has slowed down, although he has admitted that more recently a feeling of sharpness and alertness is back.

He now employs his own personal physiotherapist, which has helped him. This is not uncommon among footballers and it is not a dismissal of the treatment he receives at Liverpool. The reality is, if he feels as though he needs a rub down late at night, wherever he is in the world, the physio is there when he needs him, even during the summer, when he is in the final weeks of his holiday.

Van Dijk does not do this because he is following a trend amongst other footballers, who post photographs on their social media pages with messages like, “the grind never stops.” He isn’t trying to impress anyone. He does it because he has realised the value of maintaining his body.

When he returned to the Liverpool team, he was warned that it would take some time for him to get used to his repaired knee. Maybe that has taken longer than expected. Given his career in the professional game started just before his 20th birthday, he does not suffer from the mental burnout experienced by other footballers.

Aged 32, he looks at Thiago Silva, who is 39 and still playing to a high level at Chelsea. So long as his body allows him to, he sees no reason why that can’t be him at Liverpool — providing they still want him.

Additional reporting: James Pearce

(Top photos: Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images; Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images; design: Samuel Richardson)

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