After the 2019 Community Shield, all everyone was talking about besides Man City’s victory was the fact that Virgil Van Dijk was finally dribbled past by an opposition player. A clip of Gabriel Jesus skipping past the Dutch defender was doing the rounds in the aftermath of that game, with many hailing the Brazilian for ending his much-talked-about statistic.
The 28-year-old enjoyed a brilliant campaign last term and has risen to become the best center-back in the world right now. One thing that highlights this claim is the fact that no player has dribbled past the former Southampton ace in his last 65 competitive games for Liverpool. That run began back in March 2018 but everyone thought Jesus had shattered this record over the weekend.
However, that does not seem to be the case. While Opta Joe tweeted on Sunday that his 65-match record came to an end in Sunday's defeat, the Mirror have proven that the widely-reported assumption is in fact false. They argue that it still stands and remains perfectly intact ahead of Friday’s Premier League kick-off.
65 - During the Community Shield final, Virgil van Dijk was dribbled past for the first time in his last 65 competitive appearances (by Gabriel Jesus) for @LFC since Mikel Merino did so for Newcastle in March 2018. Human. #CommunityShield pic.twitter.com/24B6WFcKUw
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) August 4, 2019
This is because the FA have declassified the Community Shield as a competitive game and have confirmed that it is categorized as a friendly. This means stats from this fixture do not count and are not kept on the record books.
As a result, the Dutchman is still yet to be beaten in an individual duel in a competitive fixture for his club since Mikel Merino for Newcastle early last year. This is also good news for Guardiola who was shown a yellow card due to his outburst in reaction to a challenge on Silva as the booking will not go into his disciplinary record.
