Liverpool centre-back Virgil van Dijk has claimed that the Reds “should have won” the competitive Merseyside derby against Everton on Saturday.
Jurgen Klopp’s men continued their inconsistent start to the new season at Goodison Park having been held at arms’ length by their great rivals. The hosts thought they were on route to what would have been a huge three points after Conor Coady ’s opener, only for VAR to rule the on-loan Wolves man offside.
Both sides then had further chances to win the game but both Jordan Pickford and Alisson Becker were in excellent form. Following the full-time whistle on Merseyside, Reds centre-back Van Dijk was forthright in his view on proceedings and insisted that his side should have been victors at Goodison Park.
Speaking to BT Sport, the Dutchman said: "They [Everton] had a couple of opportunities and an offside goal. They had two good saves from Alisson, I think we had a little more [chances] than that. We should have won in my opinion. It feels like we lost two points.
"We wanted to stay calm. They wanted to be aggressive, feed the crowd. We had to keep our cool and play quickly from side to side, because the spaces were so massive between the lines. Sometimes we did that, sometimes we didn’t and created unnecessary problems.”
The draw at Goodison means Liverpool have won just two out of their opening six games of the campaign. They now sit six points behind early leaders Arsenal.
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Whilst Van Dijk has recognised that the Reds cannot keep dropping points, he was satisfied to see Liverpool to not lose the game and is optimistic of his side’s fortunes improving throughout the remainder of the campaign.
Now speaking with Match of the Day he continued: "It's about winning games, and we didn't win as much as we would like to.
“We have 32 games left and everyone can have their opinion but we have players coming back from injury and hopefully everyone can stay fit and we try to get some wins. The expectation is high, we are one of the biggest clubs in the world so that will always be the case so we have to enjoy it too."
Liverpool now take a brief pause from their Premier League commitments as they get their latest Champions League campaign off and running against Serie A giants Napoli on Wednesday evening. They will then be aiming to get back to winning ways in domestic action as they host Wolverhampton Wanderers at Anfield next weekend.
