Liverpool star Virgil van Dijk refuses to talk about Lionel Messi ahead of Argentina match-up
Virgil van Dijk refused to answer any questions about Lionel Messi in the pre-match conference ahead of the Netherlands’ Quarter-Final match vs Argentina in the FIFA World Cup. The Liverpool star and the Dutch captain has led his country exceedingly well in the tournament.
Beating the USA in the Round of 16 to get to the QF, the Dutch side under Louis van Gaal has had a good run in the tournament and under their captain VVD, they could potentially make it to the finals as well.
Before a match-up against Argentina, one would believe that the questions any opposition will have to answer would obviously revolve around Lionel Messi, who is arguably one of the best players in the world.
Any questions on Messi, Van Dijk had only answer, as per the Evening Standard:
“It’s not about me, or the Netherlands, against Messi, it’s about the Netherlands against Argentina.”
He obviously wanted to shift the media focus onto Argentina and the Netherlands as a whole instead of making it about individual players taking on each other. Even if Van Dijk and Messi are two of the best players, they will progress only as a country.
Van Dijk in the World Cup
Moreover, Virgil insisted that their performance against the USA was not at their best, even with the fact that they were pretty much ruthless in their 3-1 win, this is just indicative of the fact that the former Celtic man’s confidence in his squad to do much better than they have been.
Messi and Van Dijk have come across each other twice during Virgil’s time at Liverpool, and the results have been even with Liverpool getting the better of Messi’s then-team Barca, and the other game is much more famous for the Argentine’s free-kick goal against the Reds.
Moreover, the fact that Liverpool do not have a representative in the Argentina squad would mean that Reds fans, those without affiliations with La Albiceleste, would perhaps be backing Holland in the tie.
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A World Cup in his trophy cabinet will make his legacy invincible. But as much as he refuses to get drawn into a conversation about Lionel Messi, he would know that the Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) playmaker is the man his team have to pay 100% attention to.
