Matt Whitty of the Blood Red podcast has been discussing Joe Gomez’s performance at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday night, claiming the 23-year-old bailed out teammates Virgil van Dijk and Fabinho on occasions during last night’s meeting with Arsenal.
Jurgen Klopp’s Reds suffered a narrow defeat at the hands of Mikel Arteta’s side on Wednesday evening, despite having 21 more attempts at goal than the hosts and 69% possession (as per BBC Sport).
When highlighting the positives from what was no doubt a disappointing evening overall for the champions, Whitty said:
“I thought on the positives tonight, I thought that Joe Gomez was excellent in central defence, he had a really good game, bailed out Fabinho and Van Dijk on occasions and there was a superb moment where he was under pressure, drop of the shoulder and then played a lovely long diagonal ball, Van Dijk-esque. You can really see the influence that Van Dijk has had on his development.”
Will Joe Gomez go on to be as good as Virgil van Dijk?
Yes
No
TIF Thoughts…
Gomez signed for Liverpool back in 2015 from Charlton Athletic for a fee of £4.41m (via Transfermarkt.co.uk) and has since made 107 appearances for the Reds. The defender featured from the bench in last season’s Champions League triumph against Tottenham Hotspur and recently became a Premier League champion.
It’s clear from Whitty’s comments that he believes Gomez’s Dutch teammate is having a massive influence on his career and on this particular evening, it was the England defender protecting 29-year-old Van Dijk.
Having made an error leading up to the Gunners’ equaliser, the £72m-rated defender’s performance rating was 5.71/10 according to WhoScored, which was significantly lower than the 6.31/10 rating awarded to Gomez, which backs up the podcast contributor’s point.