Virgil van Dijk says soccer shutdown will have made players consider their retirement

Virgil van Dijk admits that two months without football has forced him and other players to think about their lives after retirement.

The Liverpool defender last took the field in the Reds’ 3-2 defeat in the Champions League against Atletico Madrid on March 11, with soccer suspended worldwide almost since then in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Premier League won’t be back for more than a month yet, even at best, and Van Dijk says the absence of the game has put things in perspective for high-level players.

Asked for BT Sport If the closure has made him appreciate his soccer status more, he said: “100 percent.

“It’s hard not to be out there, show off our talents, work hard, just the little things in the game. Also play for so many fans, win, all game development, training sessions, just watch the kids.

“We spent so much time together and suddenly now they are not together for almost two months, almost.

“It’s different, it’s crazy, and it’s something you haven’t really felt before, and it makes you appreciate things a little bit more.”

On what life holds for him after soccer, he added:

“It’s going to be weird, and obviously I don’t want to think about retirement or anything like that, but it’s going to be weird.”

“It makes you think how difficult it will be for the players to make the decision to retire, because what are you going to do next?

“There will be a period of uncertainty where you have no idea what to do, and that feeling is what we sometimes have at the moment as well, because we have no idea what might happen.”