After a summer of speculation, Virgil van Dijk made his Southampton return tonight, as the Under-23 side lost 4-0 to Aston Villa.
Many Southampton fans thought they were never seen the Dutchman play in a Southampton shirt again during his transfer window, however when September 1st rolled around he was still on the the club’s books.
The defender has been making his return to fitness since getting injured in January against Leicester, having not featured in pre-season following his transfer request and public demands to leave the club.
Van Dijk was named alongside the newly-acquired Jan Bednarek with Alex McCarthy behind them in goal – Alfie Jones was the side’s captain whilst the highly-rated Nathan Tella started out on the right.
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Despite the appealing line-up however, Aston Villa’s Under-23 side walked right over Radhi Jaidi’s men, scoring twice either side of half-time to coast to a 4-0 victory in the Premier League 2.
Winger Jordan Cox opened the scoreline early in the game with a low, placed strike by McCarthy in the 13th minute.
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Cox’s second, which came just over ten minutes later, was a much more emphatic strike, finding the top corner past McCarthy who couldn’t do anything to stop the teenager’s effort.
Corey Blackett-Taylor grabbed their third goal shortly after half time when a poor back pass saw the youngster one-on-one with Saints’ back-up stopper, who was comfortably beaten by the Villa man.
Five minutes later and they had a fourth through Callum O’Hare, with Virgil and Bednarek defending gingerly at the back and allowing the attacker to run at the defence, before calmly slotting it past Macca.
It was a return to forget for van Dijk, who in truth showed little effort defensively as he made his return to fitness.