Virgil van Dijk and Nemanja Vidic are two of the greatest players in Premier League history.

Liverpool are really feeling the absence of their number one defender since he was ruled out for the majority of the season courtesy of Jordan Pickford's brutal challenge in the Merseyside Derby.

While there's still good reason to think that Jurgen Klopp can challenge to retain the title without him, the fact Van Dijk played every minute of the Reds' Premier League triumph speaks volumes.

Vidic vs Van Dijk

In fact, his achievements at Anfield have been so impressive that he's drawn comparisons to Vidic who is arguably the greatest defender to ever set foot in the Premier League.

At the very least, the Manchester United juggernaut is distinct for being the only defender to have ever won the competition's Player of the Year award twice - and all in just three years to boot.

Naturally, considering Liverpool and United fans have a long-standing rivalry, their respective supporters tend to have pretty partisan ideas on whether Van Dijk or Vidic is superior.

p1epbm2luu11tl5ei8tu19gl1fnjd.jpg

Passionate arguments

The Old Trafford faithful tends to point towards Vidic's longevity as his main selling point, while Kopites love to unearth footage of Fernando Torres running the United hero ragged in response.

But what could possibly settle the debate quicker than stats - right? Ok, ok, yes, data isn't everything in football, but sometimes it's the closest we can come to gaining insight about top players.

And we couldn't resist using the comparison tool on the Premier League website to see how Van Dijk and Vidic shape up during their greatest ever seasons.

p1epbm3j3t5s0j2oo3e5ed1u34f.jpg

Comparing their Premier League stats

For Van Dijk, we're taking the campaign in which he marshalled the Reds to Champions League glory, finished second in the Ballon d'Or votes and wasn't dribbled past once in club football.

And for Vidic, we're nominating the season where United won their third consecutive Premier League title, shipped just 24 goals and went an astonishing 1,311 minutes without conceding.

If that sounds like a clash of the titans, then you're not wrong, so check out who emerged victorious when we put the stats behind their greatness under the microscope:

p1epbm0l4tgkpp96pli1j7c27cb.jpg

Landslide win for Vidic

Wowsers - I bet you weren't expecting a landslide of those proportions.

Vidic kept more clean sheets; conceded fewer goals; made more blocks, tackles, interceptions, clearances; made the same amount of errors leading to goals and conceded fewer penalties.

In fact, the only metric in which Van Dijk gets the upper hand is aerial battles won with his tally of 181 dwarfing the 121 that Vidic mustered alongside Rio Ferdinand and co.

p1epblvpbl6af18ojd8d7ao8nj9.jpg

Now, look, like we said earlier, stats aren't everything and I think we all know that Vidic vs Van Dijk is closer than an absolute whitewash of data would have you believe.

That being said, in this writer's humble opinion, Vidic must be considered the superior Premier League great for now, but that's not to say that Van Dijk can't turn the tide in the years to come.