The Reds centre-back has been a revelation since arriving at Anfield.
Liverpool centre-back Virgil van Dijk has been praised by Conor Coady, the Wolverhampton Wanderers skipper and fellow defender highlighting one moment in the Champions League final against Tottenham Hotspur which stood out for him as testament to his quality.
The Dutchman has been a revelation since joining the Reds from Southampton in January 2018 for a reported £75million fee, an outlay of money which initially drew criticism from some quarters.
However, in a short space of time, Van Dijk proved a key component in transforming a shaky Liverpool defence into a solid, tight-knit unit, the team reaching the Champions League final that summer and going from strength to strength in the following 12 months.
In the season just gone, the 27-year-old has gone from superb to world class, helping the Anfield side win the Champions League trophy as well as push an impressive Manchester City team all the way in the Premier League.
Coady, whose Wolves outfit played Liverpool three times last season, picked out the 75th-minute moment in which Spurs ace Son Heung-min burst through the Reds defence, only for Van Dijk to calmly thwart the danger.
“The best thing about him is he is always in control of what he is doing, he is in control of an attacker, he is in control of how to defend a one-v-one,” the Wanderers captain and Liverpool academy graduate is quoted by the official Reds website as saying.
“I remember when Son was running at him in the Champions League final, you always knew he was in control of what he was doing and he ended up making a tackle in the end – which he has done for the majority of the season. The way he has changed Liverpool has been brilliant to see.”
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