Virgil van Dijk said that the expectation on Liverpool, along with the atmosphere at the City Ground, made it "tough" for Jurgen Klopp's men against Nottingham Forest.
Diogo Jota’s second-half strike gave Liverpool a narrow 1-0 victory in the FA Cup quarter-final. But Forest gave their Premier League visitors a number of scares throughout the game.
Forest went into the game looking to cause their third upset of the competition after wins over Premier League sides Arsenal and Leicester City in the third and fourth rounds. And van Dijk said that being the favourites to go through wouldn’t have helped Liverpool.
READ MORE: Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp sends special ‘European’ message to Nottingham Forest
READ MORE: The case for Joe Lolley to play a key part in Nottingham Forest's run-in
“Obviously they had quite a good run until today, so we were prepared. It’s one of those games you can’t really do it too well – everyone expects you to win because we are the Premier League side, we are Liverpool,” he told the club’s official website. “So we had to stay focused, stay positive and stay patient, work as hard or harder than them at least, and finish our chances off.”
The central defender also had a word of praise for the atmosphere created by Forest fans at the City Ground: “It was tough; nice atmosphere, but in the end I think we deserved to go through,” he added.
The final few minutes of the game saw Forest throw everything at their opponents as they aimed to take the tie to extra time. And van Dijk praised his team’s resilience to keep Steve Cooper’s side out.
“At one point they played 4-2-4 or 3-3-4 when they take all the risks and there was a lot of space to maybe kill off the game,” he said. “You have to deal with these moments as well, even knowing how tough these are, but it’s good to get the clean sheet, win and move to Wembley, of course.”
