If you were choosing one word to sum up Liverpool going into the new Premier League season, it would be ‘undercooked’.

With six permanent departures from Anfield this summer, Jurgen Klopp’s side have lost a staggering 1,776 worth of Premier League appearances.

Five of those exits were midfielders, with just two signings through the door to replace them and the club labelled ‘embarrassing’ by legend Jamie Carragher for a drawn-out saga to sign a replacement No 6 in Romeo Lavia, from Championship club Southampton.

And Virgil Van Dijk, the new captain after long-standing Jordan Henderson controversially jetted off to Saudi Arabia, says he understands Liverpool fans’ anxieties going into the new season, with defensive frailties shown in pre-season and ‘big characters’ no longer at the club.

Asked whether fans’ uncertainties are valid, Van Dijk said: ‘Yeah, I can definitely understand it. I’m not a very negative person, so obviously it’s not in my mind to think like that.

Virgil Van Dijk has admitted he can understand why some Liverpool fans might have concerns about the club’s summer transfer business

The Liverpool squad has been bolstered by just two new arrivals, and a leaky defence has conceded 11 goals in five pre-season matches

‘But when a lot of players are leaving – your captain and vice-captain – and at the moment there are only two incomings… and the way we have been playing, in possession really good but defensively not as good, I can understand some people having doubts.

‘Let’s see if more players are coming in, and then we have to be ready again for a long season. It will be very tough if we look at the teams around us, but we want to be up there again, we want to be challenging.’

So can Liverpool do as Van Dijk wishes and challenge for the title? Although they look sharper than this time last year, it feels like Klopp enters the new campaign with more questions than answers, most notably around the makeshift midfield and Trent Alexander-Arnold conundrum.

With Henderson, Fabinho, James Milner, Naby Keita and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain no longer at the club, Klopp has been left scratching his head over who starts in the holding midfield role. In pre-season, Alexander-Arnold, Curtis Jones and Alexis Mac Allister have all featured there.

Each of them have redeeming features but it is not enough for a team serious about a title charge. Conor Bradley played at right-back during friendlies in Germany, with Alexander-Arnold starting in midfield, but the Northern Irishman, 20, is now injured.

So Jones or Mac Allister have played there, with Alexander-Arnold roaming into midfield areas from full-back. This leaves gaping holes behind, which teams have exploited. The system Klopp is trying to play is not dissimilar from the shape in which Manchester City used last season.

But Liverpool lack two key things in which City’s Treble winners had in that system: the incredible recovery pace of Kyle Walker to cover spaces left behind by John Stones, and the tactical discipline of Nathan Ake or Manu Akanji, who were willing to stay back and form a back three.

Instead, with Alexander-Arnold in midfield, Liverpool are left with Andy Robertson unsure whether to stay put or bomb forward with his customary runs down the left. On the other side, Ibou Konate is too often left covering too much space and the Reds become overwhelmed.

And so as bizarre as it might sound, Liverpool’s successes this season might rest on the signing of a 19-year-old from a second-tier club. Lavia has a bright future and would not solve all of these problems but he would provide a defensive shield that has been lost in summer exits.

Jurgen Klopp has seen 1,776 worth of Premier League appearances depart in recent weeks, including captain Jordan Henderson