Former Everton manager Sam Allardyce has dismissed claims that Virgil van Dijk is the greatest Premier League centre-back of all time.<\/p>\n
However, he acknowledges that if the Liverpool captain leads his team to the championship in May, it would rank as one of the league\u2019s greatest achievements.<\/p>\n
Van Dijk has been in exceptional form this season, playing a key role in helping Liverpool establish a nine-point lead at the top of the Premier League with 11 wins from 13 matches.<\/p>\n
His dominant display in Sunday\u2019s 2-0 victory over Manchester City, where he neutralized Erling Haaland, prompted Sky Sports pundit and former Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher to declare Van Dijk the best centre-back in Premier League history, surpassing Chelsea legend John Terry.<\/p>\n
Allardyce, who played as a centre-back during his career with teams like Bolton Wanderers, Coventry City, and Millwall, strongly disagrees with that assessment.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think he\u2019s the best of all time, no,\u201d Allardyce said. \u201cNot when you consider the quality of centre-backs we\u2019ve seen in the Premier League over the years. He should be in the top six, but he\u2019s not number one.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter his cruciate ligament injury at Everton, he seemed to lose a step and struggled to read the game as well as before.<\/p>\n
But now he appears to have fully recovered, which is impressive given the severity of that injury. He\u2019s back to his best.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s undoubtedly among the best, but calling him the greatest ever is a big statement. Of course, Carragher would say that\u2014he\u2019s Liverpool through and through.<\/p>\n
I\u2019d say Van Dijk is the best centre-back right now, by a considerable margin. If Liverpool were to lose him, it would be a massive blow.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former Everton manager Sam Allardyce has dismissed claims that Virgil van Dijk is the greatest Premier League centre-back of all time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":14669,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"yoast_head":"\n