Before Tuesday night’s entertaining Bigger Cup match at Anfield, Jack Reacher was invariably Football Daily’s go-to guy when it came to watching a giant man deliver a calmly authoritative, surgically precise and brutal takedown on an Amazon Prime TV show. But in the aftermath of Liverpool’s thoroughly deserved win over Real Madrid, it was Virgil van Dijk who strode purposefully down the touchline with vengeance and a ruthless, immediate form of vigilante justice on his mind, as he spied Wayne Rooney standing at second slip in the four-strong cordon of pundits offering their post-match thoughts to Gabby Logan.

Taking the proffered microphone and towering over the former England international who had recently used his BBC podcast to publicly criticise the Liverpool captain for his poor leadership and body language, Van Dijk stressed the importance of staying calm and keeping things in perspective in “a world of chaos”, specifically one where Liverpool had contrived to lose six out of seven matches and become the recipients of regular shoeings from assorted pundits, including the eponymous presenter of The Wayne Rooney Show. “You looking at anybody round here in particular?” asked Gabby mischievously, stopping just short of handing her other guests –...