Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk encouraged his teammates to “look in the mirror” after the Reds slumped to a fourth straight league loss on Saturday night.
The Dutch skipper did not absolve himself of blame, but it was telling that he also called upon “the people that were celebrating with us last year” to show up in these times of strife.
Van Dijk was one of several players who struggled during Liverpool’s 3–2 defeat away to Brentford this weekend. The towering centre back never got to grips with Igor Thiago’s physical game and gave away a second-half penalty which the Brazilian converted.
During his postmatch press duties with , Van Dijk let out a long sigh before lamenting: “The fact is that we didn’t keep clean sheets for nine games. It’s easy then to blame a particular person or the back line or set pieces, but it’s a collective thing in the end as well. Everyone has to look in the mirror, including myself.
“That’s what we all do and that’s what we all have discussed as well. I’m sure we will get out of this, but we don’t get out of this just by talking about it,” Van Dijk stressed.
“We’ll try to improve, that’s what we work on; it’s not that we’re doing nothing in training or nothing behind the scenes. We all want to improve, that’s why we’re on the pitch as well. But it’s tough at the moment.
“We need each other, we need the support, we need the people that were celebrating with us as well last year to be there for us now even more, and then I’m very confident that we will get out of this because we have the quality offensively, defensively.
“But the reality is we are looking for a clean sheet but definitely for a win again. That’s the reality.”
Liverpool have conceded 21 goals across 14 matches this term. They had let in nine at this stage of last season. Over the last four games alone, the defending champions have shipped eight goals, thanks in part to a worryingly repeatable tactic being deployed by several opponents.
