{"id":76860,"date":"2025-09-21T11:00:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T11:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/76860\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T11:00:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T11:00:08","slug":"virgil-van-dijk-explains-why-it-took-ryan-gravenberch-a-year-to-adapt-at-liverpool-liverpool-fc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/76860\/","title":{"rendered":"Virgil van Dijk explains why it took Ryan Gravenberch a year to adapt at Liverpool – Liverpool FC"},"content":{"rendered":"

Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk<\/a> believes Ryan Gravenberch<\/a> is in the form of his life but there is still plenty of room for improvement for the Netherlands midfielder.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The midfielder became the youngest player (23 years and 127 days) to score and assist in a Premier League<\/a> Merseyside derby, which extended their 100 per cent record to five matches.<\/p>\n

Last season\u2019s Premier League<\/a> young player of the year was coming off arguably his best game for the club in Wednesday\u2019s Champions League<\/a> victory over Atletico Madrid, and since his conversion to a number six by Arne Slot<\/a> when the head coach arrived last season his fellow Dutchman has become integral to their success.<\/p>\n

Only a year ago Liverpool had done a deal for Real Sociedad\u2019s Martin Zubimendi to fill the role only for the player to back out at the 11th hour, eventually joining Arsenal<\/a> this summer.<\/p>\n

\"LIVERPOOL,<\/p>\n

Slot turned to a youngster, who under predecessor Jurgen Klopp<\/a> had made just 21 starts \u2013 nine of which were in cup competitions \u2013 in his maiden campaign, and has never looked back.<\/p>\n

It makes the \u00a334million they paid Bayern Munich<\/a> for the former Ajax academy graduate look like a bargain.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot just this season, he\u2019s been playing like that from the moment last season started. He\u2019s unbelievable. He\u2019s very important to the way we play,\u201d said Van Dijk.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou see the amount of times I try to look for him. It benefits him, me and the team. He\u2019s in incredible shape. He\u2019s in the form of his life. He has to keep going. He\u2019s still young.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe expectation level will always be right up there and that\u2019s what he has to try to reach every three or four days. It\u2019s a nice challenge.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring his first season here he hardly played either. Listen, it\u2019s a mix of everything: getting confidence, progressing and improving as a player, playing games at the highest level and knowing your role in the team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very pleased for him because he puts in a lot of hard work to do what he is doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gravenberch\u2019s ability to defend and attack has stood out particularly this season.<\/p>\n

His goal against Everton<\/a> was his second in five matches, half the number he got in his first season and two more than he managed in the whole of the title-winning campaign.<\/p>\n

It has added an extra dimension to Liverpool\u2019s play as teams can no longer assume he will just hold the centre and allow his more creative team-mates to play.<\/p>\n

His 10th-minute goal was perfectly executed, allowing Mohamed Salah<\/a>\u2019s looping pass to drop before hooking it over goalkeeper Jordan Pickford.<\/p>\n

\"LIVERPOOL,<\/p>\n

The pass he played for \u00a369million summer signing Hugo Ekitike<\/a> to score his fourth goal in seven matches was perfectly weighted and showed how he is not just a midfield destroyer.<\/p>\n

But, following a familiar pattern, Liverpool could not extend their two-goal advantage or even look comfortable holding it and Idrissa Gueye\u2019s 58th-minute strike made for a tense finale.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think you can expect any easy games in the Premier League<\/a>,\u201d added Van Dijk.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about getting over the line. Of course you want to win comfortably but that\u2019s not always easy. Sometimes you have to fight and that\u2019s what we did in the second half.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk believes Ryan Gravenberch is in the form of his life but there is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76861,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[18,19,17,50233,8070,132,19619],"class_list":{"0":"post-76860","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-liverpool-vs-everton","12":"tag-ryan-gravenberch","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-virgil-van-dijk"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}