Steven Gerrard Reveals The Premier League Star He Wanted At Liverpool

During his 17 years as a Liverpool player, Steven Gerrard played alongside some of the finest players in Premier League history, but there was one player the former Reds' captain was desperate to line up with at Anfield and never got the chance to.

And it's a player who has caused the Merseyside club a great deal of controversy, this summer.

Southampton's Virgil van Dijk has been publicly courted by Liverpool, this summer, with the Anfield club's approach leading to the Saints reporting them to the Premier League and forcing a grovelling public apology from the Reds board.

It seemed as though that incident had put an end to Liverpool's chances of landing the Dutch defender, but with van Dijk handing in a transfer request to force a move away from St.Mary's, there is now believed to be some chance that he may actually find his way to Anfield after all.

Van Dijk

The Dutchman has been a huge success at Southampton since arriving at St.Mary's two seasons ago. Image: PA

It's a move Gerrard would welcome, having recommended that Liverpool sign van Dijk in 2015, when the defender was still a Celtic player.

According to Express Sport, the Liverpool legend said: "I think he's an amazing player. I think he would strengthen any team in the league.

"[From] what I have seen at Celtic, what suggested at Southampton, I was actually hoping we [Liverpool] would go make a bid for him when he came from Celtic."It was no surprise to me that he set the world alight at Southampton.

"You can understand why the fee is going to be huge, if he eventually gets this transfer over the line.

"You'd think of all them top four teams, even the top six, he'd make them all better."

Former Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard was a big fan of van Dijk when the Dutchman was still at Celtic. Images: PA

Van Dijk has made 68 appearances for Southampton since he arrived on the south coast two years ago in a £13 million deal from Celtic. The Dutch centre-half missed the second half of last season, however, after sustaining an injury during a Premier League game with Leicester City, in January.

(H/T Express)

Topics: Football, Southampton, Virgil Van Dijk, Steven Gerrard, Liverpool FC

Joe Baiamonte

Northerner. Assistant Editor of SPORTbible. Studied Journalism and Broadcasting in a portakabin on a car park of Salford University for three years. Believes football peaked with Serie A in the '90s and strong-arms pro wrestling references into as many articles as possible. Neymar once took 50 euros off me during a game of poker.

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