Virgil van Dijk has issued a public apology to Liverpool supporters after admitting his side effectively gave up during their 4-0 FA Cup quarter-final defeat against Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium on Saturday.
The Liverpool captain was furious with the second-half display in particular, during which the Reds collapsed from 2-0 down to concede twice more in quick succession. Erling Haaland had scored twice before half-time, the first from the penalty spot after Van Dijk’s foul, before Antoine Semenyo added a third immediately after the restart and Haaland completed his hat-trick shortly afterwards. The capitulation triggered a mass exodus of Liverpool’s 8,000 travelling supporters well before the final whistle.
Van Dijk did not attempt to deflect responsibility. “I can only apologise to the fans for what we have shown, especially in the second half,” he said. “Obviously you come out from the dressing room with the right intentions, to hopefully score and make it 2-1 as soon as possible. The opposite happens, and to come back from 3-0 is obviously very difficult here. But you also should not give up, and that is maybe, at a certain point, what happened. We let our fans down, we let ourselves down, and the manager. The way we played in the second half must hurt for everyone. It definitely hurts me.”
The result extinguished Liverpool’s remaining hopes of domestic silverware and heaped further pressure on manager Arne Slot ahead of Wednesday’s Champions League quarter-final first leg against Paris Saint-Germain in France. With the FA Cup gone, the Champions League and a top-four Premier League finish are now all that remain of Liverpool’s season.
Van Dijk urged his squad to rediscover their togetherness quickly. “PSG are waiting for us. I watched them on Friday. It will be so tough again, so we have to be ready mentally as soon as possible. I have been lucky enough to play for Liverpool for so many years. The main thing we always had was togetherness. Now we are in a little bit of a transition, but we have to find it.”
Liverpool face Fulham in the Premier League between the two legs against PSG, and Van Dijk made clear the next three matches would define what this season amounts to. “We have a responsibility to ourselves and, especially, to the fans. If we want to make something out of this season, we have to try and produce something special in the next three games. I am trying to think about how we can turn this round. It is a difficult one to take and everyone has to look at themselves.”
