Even after Liverpool’s move for Virgil van Dijk failing spectacularly in the summer, it seems like we are still favourites to sign the 26-year-old Dutch defender.

The former Celtic centre-back was one of our priority signings in the summer but any attempts to sign the defender were rebuffed by Southampton and then they even reported us to the Premier League.

We ended our pursuit of the defender by publicly stating that we were not going to move for him and even more surprisingly, we didn’t even attempt to sign him during the final few days of the summer transfer window, despite being made favourites to sign him before the end of it all.

Now the Mirror carries a report which claims that all the bookmakers have made us favourites again to sign the player in the January window.

Van Dijk was taken out of the first team after he submitted a transfer request and the club have refused to let him leave. However, they could be willing to sell him off should we still lodge a big bid for the 26-year-old.

The need for a quality centre-back is of utmost importance as we have struggled to keep cleansheets. With Dejan Lovren recently commenting that he is having to play with painkillers, we must get someone in to ensure our season does not go down the drain.

Our attack has been scintillating, but the defence has a lot of work to do. Should we be able to keep a number of cleansheets, it would certainly give us the chance to win more games.

We have seen how a poor defence affects the side, with our previous match against Spartak Moscow showing that not keeping the ball out of our net can cost us two points, even though we may have a number of chances to win the game.

Leicester City were also close to at least getting a point against us but a save from Simon Mignolet from the penalty spot saved our blushes.

Despite these reports, it seems highly unlikely that the player will be joining us in the winter window. Jurgen Klopp needs to find an alternative to the Dutch defender and not bringing in a central defender in January could be suicidal for us.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ng5Nb4Cdk0