Klopp on Van Dijk: 'We'll be with him throughout his recovery'
Jürgen Klopp and Liverpool will do everything possible to support Virgil van Dijk throughout his rehabilitation period.
The Reds’ No.4 requires surgery on the knee injury he sustained during Saturday’s Merseyside derby at Goodison Park and has stated in a post on social media that he is now focused fully on returning to fitness as soon as possible.
Klopp, meanwhile, sees Monday as day one of Van Dijk’s recovery – a process he insists the centre-back will not face alone.
“That’s all not sorted yet,” the boss told Liverpoolfc.com, when asked when Van Dijk’s operation will take place.
“A few things are clear, so he now will be out for a while, that’s clear. We don’t want to set any timeframe, to be honest, because each player is different and each individual is different and these possible timeframes are always for the x, y, z player [but] Virgil is Virgil and we don’t want to set any timeframe.
“But he will be out for a pretty long time and that’s what the situation is. That’s what we know since… I expected it pretty much on Saturday after the game immediately, especially when I saw the challenge back. I saw it the first time only from the bench, and when I saw it back I was pretty clear that he will be out for a long time.
“So we feel now in this moment extremely, extremely for him because most of us were in a similar situation and we know that these situations are absolutely rubbish. You don’t need it. You don’t need it but you have to get over it and Virgil will get over it, 100 per cent, and today is already the first day, if you want, of the recovery.
“We go already in the right direction and so that’s OK and the rest is football and life, like always a challenge, so see what you get and then make the best of it and that’s what we do now.”
Klopp has, of course, been in touch with Van Dijk and reported that the Dutchman is feeling ‘OK’.
The manager continued: “It’s always the same, players love to be rather on their own in the moment and to deal in the first moment with it. I am long enough in the business to know that. I was injured myself, I had exactly the same injury if I’m right and it’s not then that you are then pretty chatty.
“It all will start but we are in contact, of course, we are in contact. We are there for him, he knows that and we will wait for him like a good wife is waiting when the husband is in jail and will do, meanwhile, all what we can do to make it as easy for him as possible.”