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#3 He’s already captain of his country
Often when an international side selects a new captain, they tend to go for an experienced player and a lot of the time they’ll pick someone who is already captain of their club. When Ronald Koeman took over the managerial duties for the Netherlands earlier in 2018 though, the man he chose as his new captain was none other than van Dijk.
It didn’t really come as a surprise given that Koeman and van Dijk had worked together at Southampton – it was Koeman who signed the Dutch defender from Celtic – and van Dijk has always credited Koeman with getting him to the top in the Premier League, but it also says a lot about the defender’s leadership qualities.
Despite the Netherlands currently being in a rebuilding phase following failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup, the fact that van Dijk has been selected to captain his country surely means that he’s a future club captain too. The two roles go hand-in-hand after all, and the fact that he already captains the Netherlands would instantly give him the respect he’d need to captain Liverpool as well, particularly if he can bring some success back to his international side.
