Liverpool’s pursuit of Virgil van Dijk takes a strange turn

Over the last week, we’ve seen numerous reports and rumors that Liverpool were chasing Southampton defender Virgil van Dijk. It’s a rumor that makes sense given Van Dijk’s quality and Liverpool’s needs, and given the clubs’ histories with each other it’s not unreasonable to expect that a deal would get done eventually.

That appeared to be the case on Monday, when reports filtered out that a deal was close as Van Dijk himself wanted to move to Liverpool over other interested parties. That excitement for Liverpool fans took a sudden turn on Tuesday, when Southampton announced that they had reported Liverpool to the Premier League for tampering with their player, making an approach to him without going through the club first.

That brings us to Wednesday, when the saga between Liverpool, Virgil van Dijk, and Southampton took a rather strange turn.

This news creates an odd situation for everyone involved. Liverpool come out of it with egg on their face, without their top defensive target, and with everyone keeping a closer eye on how they go about their transfer business. Southampton now have to figure out how to handle a player who clearly wants out ASAP, not to mention Van Dijk himself who needs to figure out exactly where he wants to go.

Now, just because Liverpool say that they’ve ended their formal interest in the player doesn’t mean that they can’t still wind up with him. A somewhat similar situation between the same two clubs a couple years ago, that time involving Dejan Lovren, ended with Lovren forcing his way to Liverpool by refusing to go anywhere else. Van Dijk can easily wind up doing the same thing if he really does want to head to Anfield instead of to, say, Chelsea or Manchester City.

In other words, this saga is probably not over yet. It’s going to be interesting to see what twists and turns it takes before Van Dijk signs a contract — and with what team he winds up signing.