Sports
Dissecting Haaland vs Van Dijk: When the league's best striker took on its best defender
The best striker in the Premier League versus the best defender in the Premier League in a one-on-one showdown with millions of people watching across the world?
Liverpool vs Manchester City had far bigger things at stake on Sunday (it finished 1-1 for those of you who live on Mars) but those few seconds when Erling Haaland took on Virgil van Dijk were explosive and exciting.
Two masters of their art had almost 3,500 square metres of hallowed Anfield turf to themselves.
Haaland thundered towards goal, dancing around the ball with protracted step-overs and feints, desperate to tempt a challenge from the game’s most unflappable centre-half. But the Dutchman resisted, back-tracking towards his own goal, and though he ultimately could not stop Haaland from slipping away and taking on the shot, it was an effort comfortably collected by his goalkeeper.
Fantastic defending, or a slice of luck? The Athletic breaks it down, with the help of former Premier League strikers and centre-backs.
The Premier League title race on The Athletic…
So, the ball breaks, and you’re staring down a single defender, with the freedom of the pitch to work with. What is going through your head?
“Well, you’re weighing up who you’re up against”, the Premier League’s all-time top goalscorer Alan Shearer tells The Athletic. “If, for argument’s sake, you’re up against a guy who you know is not as quick, then the obvious thing you’re going to do is knock it and run it.”
“But he knows he isn’t going to do that to Virgil, because the Liverpool defender is one of the few people who can keep up with Haaland — even running backwards.”
The solution is to unsettle Van Dijk, to throw him off balance with a series of twisting dummies and drives. During a five-second stampede, the Norwegian throws in three body feints, two changes of direction and one devastating burst of pace to finally break away from his defender’s grasp.
Haaland’s first move is to dart onto his right foot; this is across the defender’s body and away from where Van Dijk is trying to show him, but onto his weaker foot.
Note Van Dijk’s body shape — side-on and crouched low, able to shift his body weight if required. That stance, according to former Ivory Coast centre-back Sol Bamba, is crucial to the battle.
“Usually, if I was coaching a young defender, I would not tell them to turn their back to the ball so much. But Van Dijk never loses sight of where Haaland is — he is low on his knees and side-on, which means he is prepared to spring in any direction to follow his run.”
Seconds later, and Haaland has changed tack once again.
“What he’s trying to do is go left, go right, go left, go right, and then try to get Virgil off balance to gain control of the duel. But the defender doesn’t dive in, he stands up the whole way,” says Shearer.
It is a move for which Van Dijk has become renowned during his imperious spell at the heart of Liverpool’s defence, famously warding Tottenham’s Moussa Sissoko onto his left foot during a similar break back in 2019.
Statistically, that shows through with the ‘true’ tackles metric, which combines tackles won and lost, as well as fouls committed while attempting a tackle, to measure how often a player looks to “stick a foot in”. Over the last five seasons, Van Dijk averages just 2.2 tackle attempts per game, but crucially, his success rate is up at a very high 61 per cent.
“He never dives in and that’s an art”, says Bamba. “It is so easy to be tempted to go in for the tackle, but if you dive in, someone like Haaland is just going to push the ball past you and beat you.”
“If it was me, I probably would have committed,” Bamba continues, “Neil Warnock used to say to us, ‘If the ball passes, the striker doesn’t!’.”
“But it takes real discipline to back off like that. Van Dijk is clever, plays with his head and reads the game really well.”
The relentless Haaland continues to twist and turn even as the spaces continue to be shut down.
Having already turned Van Dijk around twice, the striker plants his right foot as if he is about to drag the ball over with his left, but instead ducks to the opposite side and continues onto his stronger foot.
Here we can see the subtle move in three frames, as Haaland nudges the ball underneath Van Dijk’s trailing boot and powers towards the penalty area.
The resulting shot, however, is weak, and Shearer puts that down to the defensive pressure.
“Because he hadn’t had much joy in going left and right, Haaland is thinking, ‘Right, I’m going to run out of time in a minute, so I have to get my shot away pretty quickly’.”
“In reality, he would have preferred to be another three or four yards closer, so that’s part of Van Dijk doing his job and making the forward’s mind up to take the shot where he has done”
Having kept close to Haaland all the way through, the defender even manages to lean into the striker just as he is lining up his shot.
Off balance, forced wide, and with his angles narrowed down, patient defensive play and constant attention to the ball have minimised the probability of the world’s most lethal striker getting a clean shot away, an effort valued at 0.10 expected goals by Opta, essentially suggesting an average player would have a 10 per cent chance of scoring. Not a bad result from an intimidating one-v-one.
“He makes it so uncomfortable for him,” says Bamba, “He is so close to him for 40 metres, and forces him into a difficult shot.”
“I would’ve fancied it in my heyday, yeah!” chuckled Shearer, asked if he would have enjoyed such a showdown in a massive game such as this. You can’t begrudge the confidence from a man with 260 Premier League goals.
But there aren’t many players in world football who can reliably beat Van Dijk in a one-v-one, as his latest titanic tussle showed.
“He would have believed in himself in that situation, Haaland, but it just didn’t happen”, said Shearer, “and that was more through really, really good defending than it was poor attacking play.”
Let’s hope we get a re-run again soon.
(Top photo: Premier League)
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LAS VEGAS – Danhausen’s curse may be real after all – just ask Stephen A. Smith and the New York Mets.
While the latter dropped their 10th game in a row, Smith got his share of the curse on Saturday night during Night 1 of WrestleMania 42. Smith was in attendance for WWE’s premier event of the year and heard massive boos from the crowd.
Stephen A. Smith attends WrestleMania 42: Night 1 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada, on April 18, 2026. (Andrew Timms/WWE)
Smith was sitting ringside to watch the action. The ESPN star appeared on the videoboard above the ring at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. He appeared to embrace the reaction and smiled through it.
The boos came after Danhausen appeared on “First Take” on Friday – much to the chagrin of the sports pundit. Smith appeared perplexed by Danhausen’s appearance. Smith said he heard about Danhausen and called him a “bad luck charm.”
Danhausen said Smith had been “rude” to him and put the dreaded “curse” on the commentator.
WWE STAR DANHAUSEN SAYS METS ‘CURSE’ ISN’T EXACTLY LIFTED AS TEAM DROPS NINTH STRAIGHT GAME
Stephen A. Smith attends WrestleMania 42: Night 1 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada, on April 18, 2026. (Andrew Timms/WWE)
Smith is far from the only one dealing with the effects of the “curse.”
Danhausen agreed to “un-curse” the Mets during their losing streak. However, he told Fox News Digital earlier this week that there was a reason why the curse’s removal didn’t take full effect.
“I did un-curse the Mets. But it didn’t work because, I believe it was Brian Gewirtz who did not pay Danhausen. He did not send me my money so it did not take full effect,” Danhausen said. “Once I have the money, perhaps it will actually work because right now it’s probably about a half of an un-cursing. It’s like a layaway situation.”
Danhausen enters the arena before his match against Kit Wilson during SmackDown at SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., on April 10, 2026. (Eakin Howard/Getty Images)
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On “Friday Night SmackDown,” WWE stars like The Miz and Kit Wilson were also targets of Danhausen’s curse.
It’s time to reveal memories, laughs and crazy times from Randy Rosenbloom’s 55 years as a TV/radio broadcaster in Los Angeles. He’s hopping in a car next Sunday with his wife, saying goodbye to a North Hollywood house that’s been in his family since 1952 and driving 3,300 miles to his new home in Greenville, S.C.
“When I walk out, I’ll probably break down,” he said.
He graduated from North Hollywood High in 1969. He got his first paid job in 1971 calling Hart basketball games for NBC Cable Newhall for $10 a game. It began an adventure of a lifetime.
“I never knew if I overachieved or underachieved. I just did what I loved,” he said.
Randy Rosenbloom (left) used to work with former UCLA coach John Wooden for TV games.
(Randy Rosenbloom)
John Wooden, Jerry Tarkanian and Jim Harrick were among his expert commentators when he did play by play for college basketball games. He called volleyball at the 1992 and 1996 Olympic Games for NBC and rowing in 2004. He’s worked more than 100 championship high school events. He did play by play for the first and only Reebok Bowl at Angel Stadium in 1994 won by Bishop Amat over Sylmar, 35-14.
“There were about 5,000, 6,000 people there and I remember thinking nobody watched the game. We ended up with a 5.7 TV rating on Channel 13 in Los Angeles, which is higher than most Lakers games.”
He conducted interviews with NFL Hall of Famers Gale Sayers and Johnny Unitas and boxing greats Robert Duran, Thomas Hearn and Sugar Ray Leonard. He’s worked with baseball greats Steve Garvey and Doug DeCinces. He called games with former USC coach Rod Dedeaux. He was in the radio booth for Bret Saberhagen’s 1982 no-hitter in the City Section championship game at Dodger Stadium. He was a nightly sportscaster for KADY in Ventura.
Randy Rosenbloom, left, with his volleyball broadcast partners, Kirk Kilgour and Bill Walton.
(Randy Rosenbloom)
He was the voice of Fresno State football and basketball. He also did Nevada Las Vegas football and basketball games. He called bowl games and Little League games. He was a public address announcer for basketball at the 1984 Olympic Games with Michael Jordan the star and did the P.A. for Toluca Little League.
Nothing was too small or too big for him.
“I loved everything,” he said.
He called at least 10 East L.A. Classic football games between Garfield and Roosevelt. He was there when Narbonne and San Pedro tied 21-21 in the 2008 City championship game at the Coliseum on a San Pedro touchdown with one second left.
Probably his most notable tale came when he was doing radio play-by-play at a 1998 college bowl game in Montgomery, Ala.
“I look down and a giant tarantula is crawling up my pants,” he said. “My color man took all the press notes, wadded them up and hit the tarantula like swinging a bat.”
Did Rosenbloom tell the audience what was happening?
“I stayed calm,” he said.
Then there was the time he was in the press box at Sam Boyd Stadium and a bat flew in and attached itself to the wooden press box right next to him before flying away after he said, “UNLV wins.”
Recently, he’s been putting together high school TV packages for LA36 and calling travel ball basketball games. He’ll still keep doing a radio gambling show from his new home, but he’s cutting ties to Los Angeles to move closer to grandchildren.
“I’m retiring from Los Angeles. I’m leaving the market,” he said.
Hopefully he’ll continue via Zoom to do a weekly podcast with me for The Times.
He’s a true professional who’s versatility and work ethic made him a reliable hire from the age of 18 through his current age of 74.
He’s a member of the City Section Hall of Fame and the Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. He once threw the shot put 51 feet, 7 1/2 inches, which is his claim to fame at North Hollywood High.
One time an ESPN graphic before a show spelled his name “Rosenbloom” then changed it to “Rosenblum” for postgame. It was worth a good laugh.
He always adjusts, improvises and ad-libs. He expects to enjoy his time in South Carolina, but he better watch out for tarantulas. They seem to like him.
Sports
Becky Lynch enters exclusive WWE club with Women’s Intercontinental Championship win at WrestleMania 42
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LAS VEGAS – Becky Lynch entered an atmosphere no other WWE women’s superstar has ever reached as she won the Women’s Intercontinental Championship over AJ Lee on Saturday night at WrestleMania 42.
Lynch became the first person to hold the Women’s Intercontinental Championship three times after she pinned Lee. She first won the title against Lyra Valkyria in June 2025 and then again against Maxxine Dupri in November.
Becky Lynch celebrates with the belt after defeating AJ Lee during their women’s Intercontinental Championship match at WrestleMania 42 in Las Vegas, Nev., on April 18, 2026. (Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
She dropped the belt to Lee at the Elimination Chamber, sparking a monthslong feud with her.
Lee gave Lynch the chance at the title in the weeks prior to WrestleMania 42. But it appeared Lee played right into Lynch’s plans. Despite arguing with referee Jessica Carr for most of the match, Lynch was able to tactfully tear down a rope buckle and use it to her advantage.
Lynch hit Lee with a Manhandle Slam and pinned her for the win.
WWE STARS REVEAL WHAT MAKES WRESTLEMANIA SO SPECIAL: ‘IT’S THE SUPER BOWL OF PRO WRESTLING’
AJ Lee reacts after losing to Becky Lynch in their Women’s Intercontinental Championship match at WrestleMania 42 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas on April 18, 2026. (Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
It’s the second straight year Lynch will leave Las Vegas as champion. She returned to WWE at WrestleMania 41, teaming with Valkyria, to win the women’s tag titles. She will now leave Allegiant Stadium as the women’s intercontinental champion.
Lynch is now a seven-time women’s champion, three-time women’s intercontinental champion and two-time tag team champion.
Becky Lynch withstands AJ Lee during their Women’s Intercontinental Championship match on night one of WrestleMania 42 at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nev., on April 18, 2026. (Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
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Lee’s reign as champion ended really before it could really begin. WrestleMania 42 was her first appearance at the event in 11 years. It’s unclear where Lee will go from here.
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