Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk refused to discuss his disallowed goal against Manchester City but went on to describe the 3-0 defeat as a ‘big blow’ to his team.
Van Dijk met a corner from Mohamed Salah in the first half and nodded the ball into the corner when the visitors were trailing 1-0 to City.
His goal would have brought the game level but Andy Robertson, who ducked underneath the ball, was judged to have been offside and an obstruction due to his movement near the goalkeeper after a VAR check.
The goal was ruled out after a review and City added a second goal just before the break before going on to take the win in what was a terrible result for Liverpool.
Speaking after the match, Van Dijk explained that there ‘was no point discussing’ the incident as the final result was more worrying for his team.
“In football the officials are deciding the key decisions and we have to deal with it on the pitch,” he said. “There is no point discussing this from my point of view. The reality is that we lost 3-0 and that is a big blow.
“It doesn’t matter what I say [about the goal] because anything I say will be in the media and the whole international break will be about my comment on the decision. I just focus on the fact we lost. You guys can debate if it should have stood.”
Liverpool manager Arne Slot was more forthcoming with his thoughts and revealed that the decision to rule out Van Dijk’s goal was an obvious fault from the officials.
“It is difficult to give my view. It is obvious and clear that the wrong decision has been made at least in my opinion,” Slot admitted.
“He didn’t interfere at all with what the goalkeeper could do. Immediately after the game someone showed me the goal that the same referee allowed – City against Wolves last season.
“So it took the linesman 13 seconds to raise his flag to say it was offside. So there was clearly communication, but as I said that could have influenced the game in a positive way for us.”
