Van Dijk Talks Ballon d’Or and Liverpool’s Title Challenge

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The Dutch international will be in Paris for the Ballon d’Or ceremony

Virgil van Dijk will be flying to Paris for the Ballon d’Or ceremony today in the hopes of somehow beating Lionel Messi to the title. Whether or not you think van Dijk had a better season than Messi (a certain Champions League semi-final aside, Messi is just infuriatingly good), the defender is pretty happy to just be in the running.

“I am going to have a look at what it is about,” he said after his brace against Brighton this weekend. “I think there are no losers on that evening.”

“I am very proud to be in that bracket, to be in there for the way I performed with the team last year and also with the country. It is just something to be proud of because not a lot of players go there and are up for these kind of things.

”There are no losers that evening — we will see what happens.”

If Messi does end up with his sixth title — something which is looking increasingly likely — it says nothing about van Dijk and Liverpool’s achievements last season and hopefully in this current season. The Dutch international is cautious about the eight point lead between the Reds and Leicester City, however.

“The gap doesn’t mean anything,” he added. “We are in a good situation points wise but we know we can do maybe that extra 10 per cent still, and we try to do it every week but it is not easy.

”The only thing we can do is to try it and hopefully it will work out, but the most important thing is to win the games.”

Source: liverpooloffside.sbnation.com