OPINION
Following consecutive draws, it has been open season on Liverpool and their players supposedly simultaneously cracking under the pressure and not good enough anyway.
Mark Lawrenson should know better, but he has joined the bandwagon by pointing the finger at the club’s best player this season and certainly the outstanding one in the 2018/19 Premier League so far.
Head-scratchingly, bafflingly, oddly, the ex-Liverpool defender has claimed Virgil van Dijk “has started to look a little bit ordinary” (BBC Sport).
Are you sure about that, Lawro? Did you not watch the Merseyside giants’ 1-1 Monday night draw against West Ham?
Sure, Liverpool were well below par and the result was about right, but Van Dijk did little wrong. He was Liverpool’s best player with yet another commanding display.
Sure, Van Dijk was partly at fault for the equaliser conceded in the draw against Leicester City five days earlier, but it was one of the few he has made in his 31 appearances this season.
The master and commander of the Liverpool back line has barely dropped his standards in a single game, and has looked the best defender in a reds shirt since Lawrenson’s old partner Alan Hansen was in his pomp.
The giant Dutchman’s aerial authority, mobility, awareness, leadership and brilliant technical ability all add up to the perfect centre-back package.
Quite which games Lawrenson has been watching to deduce Van Dijk has slipped to a mediocre level is something of a mystery.
The BBC pundit should hang his head in shame at such a baffling analysis.