Southampton's £13m swoop for Virgil van Dijk in 2015 probably doesn't get the credit it deserves.

The towering centre-back arrived at St Mary's having shone for Celtic, where he scored 15 goals in 115 games and made his name as a marauding, ball-playing defender with excellent technical ability.

However, surely nobody at Southampton felt he would become as good as he is now.

The Dutchman is currently the holder of UEFA's Men's Player of the Year award, beating Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo to the title, while he is also the reigning PFA Player of the Year.

Les Reed truly unearthed a muddied diamond when bringing the colossus to St Mary's.

As aforesaid, Van Dijk only cost Southampton £13m. When you take into account that he made 80 appearances for the club, you'd discover that the 28-year-old was worth £162.5k per appearance at St Mary's - he also scored seven goals.

Furthermore, after an excellent time on the south coast in which he helped Southampton qualify for the Europa League, while also winning the club's Player of the Season award in 2015/16, Van Dijk's ultimate exit for Liverpool netted the Saints an excellent profit.

Aside from the manner in which he left - the Dutchman handed in a transfer request - the ex-Groningen man earned Southampton a whopping £62m in profit, proving to have been an astute investment from Reed.

Using that £62m figure along with his 80 appearances, Van Dijk earned Southampton a huge £775k for each appearance he made for the club.

Van Dijk is now a Champions League, Super Cup and Club World Cup winner, and is also honing in on his first Premier League title - he also finished runner-up to Messi in the coveted Ballon d'Or award.

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However, while Jurgen Klopp and Liverpool will be strongly associated with the centre-back's heroics, people shouldn't forget that he may not have gone on to become so good had Southampton not unearthed the muddied diamond in 2015, and for relative peanuts at that.

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