Virgil van Dijk said he would speak to Mohamed Salah but insisted he could not hear any outside noise in Liverpool’s dressing room. Salah’s unusual interview at Leeds dominated the pre-match conversation before heading to Milan to face Inter on Tuesday night. However, with Salah at left back for England, the Reds did the job for Italy and won 1-0 thanks to Dominik Szoboszlai’s 88th-minute penalty.
Unsurprisingly, the post-match conversation also focused on whether Salah’s Liverpool career was over. The 250-goal forward’s incendiary comments left it unclear whether he would play for the Reds again. And captain Van Dijk admits it has been a difficult few days since his team-mates faced the press at Elland Road, but is keen to speak to the Egyptian player who has returned from Italy.
Van Dijk told Amazon Prime Video: “Obviously it’s difficult. We’re all collectively in a difficult situation. Things are going on between Mo and the club. As a result of that, he’s not here today and can’t help us try to get the three points. That’s the reality.”
“I don’t think anything has changed in terms of focus and determination to get results for the football club. If someone has to apologize, I don’t think I’m the one to say it. He’s the one to vent his feelings.”
“That’s something the club has to deal with and so do we. When you look in the dressing room the day after (the press conference) on Sunday, nothing has changed. We have a responsibility to ourselves, to the whole football club and to all our fans around the world to perform. The focus was there.”
Van Dijk’s fellow Dutch player Clarence Seedorf, an Amazon Prime pundit, told the centre-back that he thought Salah should apologize for his actions. Van Dijk added: “I’ve known Mo for a long time. We’re good friends. We’ve been through good times and bad. He’s been a big part of my success at the club and I’ve been a big part of his success.”
“We are talking, but things like that naturally stay indoors. As a team we have to brace ourselves and counter the outside noise. That’s the only thing we have to prepare for. I encourage the players to do that.”
Liverpool’s victory continues their four-match unbeaten run in a season that has seen them suffer too many defeats. And Van Dijk said: “It feels good to win.
“Especially in this time of year, you’re trying to find consistency and trying to develop things and hopefully tonight will be one of those performances. Obviously, coming here against a very good team is never easy.”
“It’s always going to be a tough game, but I think we handled the game well. It could have been a 0-0 game, but obviously it’s only once in the last few weeks that it ended with a positive result for us. There’s obviously too much noise from the outside world. If you don’t perform, especially in these circumstances, that’s completely normal. It’s also natural.”
“But it’s up to us to perform on the pitch. That’s the only thing we can control. We want to improve, we want to be consistent, we want to win games. We have the quality to do that, but we haven’t done it as well as we would like.”
“We’re just trying to stick together, we’re just trying to stick together like we’ve always done. That’s what Liverpool stands for in my opinion. I understand everyone is happy, but the reality is we have to bounce back. We’re going back to Brighton soon. Obviously you have to celebrate the good moments, you have to enjoy them. If you don’t, what’s the point of winning?”
“But the focus is already[on the weekend]. We have to stay here overnight, do all the right things, sleep well and eat well, because Brighton are coming to Anfield. We have played Brighton for many years and it is always a difficult game. What we strive for and try to achieve is never to get too high and never to get too low.”
“That’s where we have to talk to each other. It’s easy to say, but acting like that and trying to execute that is the hardest part. If we can do that, we can get back to the consistency we had last year and that’s why we were champions. That’s what we’re aiming for.”
“When you don’t win games, lose games or concede goals easily (which happened to us, and I was a part of that), the outside world starts to notice those types of things. We’re trying to find consistency and today we know they have two strikers who are very comfortable on the ball and play well with each other.”
“Everyone shifted, ran hard, and defended well. We’ll get the three points and move on.” Liverpool welcome Brighton to Anfield next, having won just one of their last five Premier League games.
This match will be Salah’s last match before departing for the African Cup of Nations. If the hosts win, they will be level on points with fourth-placed Crystal Palace, who will host title-chasing Manchester City at Selhurst Park.
