Kompany Picks Van Dijk As Premier League’s Greatest Centre-Back

Van Dijk has been a mainstay in the Premier League since joining Southampton from Celtic in the summer of 2015.

The 28-year-old’s impressive performances for the Saints earned him a £75m move to Liverpool in January 2018 and he has been responsible for transforming a leaky Reds backline into one of the meanest defensive units in the Premier League.

Van Dijk helped Liverpool win the Champions League last season which saw him crowned UEFA’s Men’s Player of the year for 2019 ahead of Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi while the Netherlands international was vital in Liverpool opening up a 25-point gap at the top of the Premier League before the season was suspended because of the Coronavirus pandemic.

Kompany, who led Manchester City to four league titles, always has his name mentioned alongside the likes of Rio Ferdinand, John Terry and Nemanja Vidic when the topic of the best defender crops up but the current Anderlecht manager believes Van Dijk trumps them all.

"I would bring it back to Virgil van Dijk," he told SPORF.

"It's a weird one because he hasn't been on the scene for as long as these names we mentioned – John Terry, Rio Ferdinand, these guys were there for a long, long time.

"But the signs he showed in his last few years, just makes it so obvious that if he would've been at the top, top level before that he would've been already further as well.

"From what I've seen in terms of having an impact on a team and a defender is never about himself, it's about his communication with other guys and how you make your team more solid.

"The Liverpool before Van Dijk and the one after him, it's a completely different setup and I'll give him that one because of that."