Why Ronald Araújo might actually be Liverpool’s next Virgil van Dijk

The arrival of Ronald Araújo was met with widespread indifference among Liverpool supporters. The Uruguayan defender has joined from Barcelona on a season-long loan with an option to buy of €55 million, around £47 million, included.

This seems like a sensible deal. The 27 year old provides cover at both right-back and centre-back, which Andoni Iraola badly needed, while the try before you buy transfers always feel more sensible.

However, Araújo's recent major downturn in form at the Catalan giants led to many Barça fans online publicly celebrating his departure, a zeitgeist which concerned their Liverpool counterparts. Nevertheless, Araújo is capable of being a top-class defender and statistics prove this. As noted by Opta, since the Uruguayan's La Liga debut, he ranks top across Europe's big five leagues for "the lowest dribbled past average" on a per 90 basis.

He has been dribbled past only 14 times in 143 league appearances during this period (0.13 per game). The man second across this metric is a certain Virgil van Dijk, who has only been dribbled past on 34 occasions in 212 appearances, which averages out to 0.16 per 90.

There was a period between March 2018 and August 2019 when the Dutchman went 50 Premier League matches without anyone dribbling past him. For a long time, Mikel Merino, at Newcastle back then, was the last man to do this, before Nicolas Pépé ended the streak during a 3-1 defeat for Arsenal at Anfield 17 months later.

So, let's take a deeper dive into van Dijk and Araújo's respective statistics.

Ronald Araújo La Liga dribbled past statistics

Note: Statistics courtesy of SofaScore. Rank among defenders minimum 12 appearances.

Virgil van Vijk Premier League dribbled past statistics

Note: Statistics courtesy of SofaScore. Rank among defenders minimum 25 appearances, aside from 2020/21.

The statistics document that both van Dijk and Araújo regularly rank highly when it comes to being dribbled past, or in their case not, across their respective leagues. Despite the perception that the Uruguayan's form has worsened in recent seasons, he has actually posted better numbers for this metric across the last two campaigns.

This is partly due to a smaller sample size, something we've tried to take into account, but some of those above him barely featured too.

Meantime, van Dijk was hardly ever dribbled past during the first half of his Liverpool career. There was something of a spike in 2022/23 and the title winning campaign under Arne Slot two years later. Last season though, the Dutchman was dribbled past only twice in the Premier League.

This goes against the eye-test, when it felt as though, in pretty much every game, Liverpool's defending was haphazardous and chaotic, but perhaps that was mainly Ibrahima Konaté, who was dribbled past ten times, for comparison.

So, what will Araújo bring? Well, the 27 year old's first outing in red should come against Como in the final pre-season friendly at Anfield on Sunday. A week later, he is currently favourite to partner van Dijk in Liverpool's Premier League opener against Newcastle United at St James' Park.

That is because Giovanni Leoni and Joe Gomez are injured, while Jérémy Jacquet is yet to feature in pre-season, albeit the Frenchman is about to change that, as he's now back in full training.

Meantime, Araújo will certainly see plenty of minutes at right-back this season. With Conor Bradley still recovering following a knee injury, and Jeremie Frimpong not trusted by former head coach Arne Slot we'll see if Iraola agrees, the Barcelona loanee is a great option to have, especially against tougher opponents. Thus, perhaps Liverpool supporters should be more enthusiastic about this signing than first appeared.