Jordan Pickford has indirectly apologised to Liverpool’s Virgil van Dijk for the challenge that left the Dutchman being subbed off after 11 minutes of this afternoon’s controversial clash away to Everton.
Sadio Mane fired the Reds into a 1-0 lead after only three minutes but the early fireworks didn’t stop there.
Soon after, Van Dijk was forced to leave the field at Goodison Park after the Everton goalkeeper raced off his line and felled the Liverpool centre-back, who had one foot planted on the turf.
And Jordan Henderson, who controversially had a last-gasp winner chalked off, has told BT Sport that Pickford told him to pass on his apologies to Van Dijk.
He told BT Sport: “To be fair, Jordan came up and apologised to me after the game and [told me] to tell Virgil.
“It mustn’t be great. But yeah, not just that incident, we created so many good chances to score and overall we should’ve won the game.”
It has been reported that Van Dijk – and Thiago Alcantara, who was on the receiving end of a nasty challenge from Richarlison which earned the latter a red card in the dying minutes – have been sent for scans to determine the extent of the injuries.
From having a goal ruled to be offside, by the technology designed to stamp out incorrect calls, to possibly losing two star players to injury, it was a disastrous day all-round for Liverpool.
The only slight consolation is that they didn’t lose, but it could and should have been a much brighter story for the Premier League champions.
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