Jurgen Klopp has told Netherlands supporters that Virgil van Dijk cannot suddenly play in the Euros after a week’s proper training, given he’s been absent since October…
Liverpool’s centre-back has been out since the early-season Merseyside Derby, in which Jordan Pickford scissored him and damaged the Dutchman’s cruciate ligaments in his knee.
His absence has in many ways defined our season and for Liverpool fans, we just want him back fully fit in time for 2021/22.
That’ll be easier if he’s given the summer off, but naturally, his country quite want their captain back for the Euros – and it looks like it’ll be quite a close-run thing.
“Virgil’s knee. Look, I don’t want to hold him back, but you cannot force it as well,” Klopp told the official website.
“Now let’s just go through all these kind of things. You are all long enough in the business to know if you want to play a tournament, you have to train before – proper football training weeks before, not a week before.
“You cannot after 10, 11 months out, train a week and play football. That’s just not possible, it should not be possible.
“Nobody holds him back, I can promise all the people in Holland or wherever. But we cannot force it as well and we will not. We speak about a player and his career.
“Nobody should force that and nobody will – not Holland, not us, and [not] Virgil as well. He just tries to get fit as quick as possible.
“In the moment, nobody knows when that will be exactly but you can imagine it will be for sure very, very tight with the Euros and the team training and stuff like this because he is not in team training yet and will not be in the next weeks. So, I don’t know.
“But in the end it’s a decision of Virgil and he will get massively influenced by the feeling in his knee.”
For us, he shouldn’t go. It’s not like VVD will play again for Liverpool this season, which means he’ll be thrust straight into a competitive game at likely breakneck speed first up.
That is not sensible – in fact – it’s very risky. And we’re not sure anybody could cope if he picked up another issue!