Virgil van Dijk “got away with” using his elbow “as a weapon” in Liverpool’s defeat to Fulham on Sunday, according to a former referee who labelled the Reds skipper a “serial offender”.
Van Dijk didn’t enjoy the best of games for the Reds, like a lot of his teammates, three goals in just 14 first-half minutes saw Fulham condemn Arne Slot’s side to their first away defeat of the season.
The captain didn’t cover himself in glory as Rodrigo Muniz took a wonderful touch to get away from him and score the host’s third of the game, but Keith Hackett– a former PGMOL and FIFA official – highlighted a challenge by Van Dijk on midfielder Sander Berge as “very dangerous”.
Discussing the contentious decisions in the game, Hackett told Football Insider: “We now go to another incident involving Van Dijk, with Berge. Van Dijk swings his forearm at Sander Berge, deliberately uses his elbow, it’s an illegal use of the elbow.
“The elbow when it’s used as a weapon is very dangerous to players and on this occasion it wasn’t spotted by VAR, neither the referee, and Virgil van Dijk got away with what should have been a clear red card.”
Hackett claimed after the Merseyside derby that Van Dijk is a ‘serial offender’ to back up the thoughts of one Joey Barton, of all people.
Amid the heavy focus on the foul by James Tarkowski on Alexis Mac Allister, Barton shared a clip of a similar challenge by Van Dijk during a Champions League match with Napoli in 2018, that he avoided punishment for, writing: ‘Different rules when it’s Liverpool players on other players. Surely, everyone knows that.’
Responding to Barton, Hackett wrote: ‘Joey we are looking at a serial offender who gets away with too much. This challenge unacceptable.’
After analysing several similar historic incidents where he felt the Dutchman avoided being shown a card, Hackett ultimately concluded after the Fulham game: “What we see in this review is a series of incidents where the Liverpool captain, is frankly getting away with sanctions that should be awarded by the match referee.”
Jamie Carragher explained how Fulham exposed a “weakness” of Van Dijk’s on Monday Night Football while analysing Alex Iwobi’s goal.
Carragher said: “The reason why Fulham have pushed it to Van Dijk is… and something Liverpool have always lacked… a left-footed centre back.
“Now, the reason I think Virgil van Dijk probably goes to [left back] Andy Robertson is it’s the obvious pass, of course. It’s not a bad pass, but maybe a left-footed centre back with the quality of Van Dijk could actually go there [and play a long-range pass from left to right and find Mo Salah in space].
“If it’s on the right side, he’s got that passing range in his locker. And that’s why I think Fulham have pushed it this side, pushed Virgil van Dijk onto his left foot. Because they know he can’t play that pass and he’s going to play the shorter pass.
“He goes to Andy Robertson and he’s just got to go back to the goalkeeper. He tries a crossfield pass, he gets it wrong and we know what happens. It was a nightmare scenario for him.”