Police, bomb scares and a 30-foot gold erection

It’s not every day that you see a nine-metre effigy on a patch of grass in front of one of the most famous clubs in England. But today, that happened, albeit briefly.

The statue, which was based on the great big fee Liverpool paid for Virgil van Dijk, arrived on a whopping flatbed lorry at around 5am in the morning.

Under the cover of darkness, yes, but it’s still difficult to hide a giant golden man that took 180 hours to make.

Construction workers – and a crane – worked to get the defender in an upright position, with help from scaffolding, a lot of metal framework and some hard hats. The process took around two hours from start to finish, and there he stood, looking proud over his new home.

Straight away people came from nearby houses to have a nosy at him in all his glory – and it’s safe to say there were plenty of bemused dog walkers. One local even dubbed him “massive golden b*llocks”, which I’m sure you’ll agree was beautifully put.

But, as these things often do, the attention didn’t go unnoticed by Anfield safety officials who were not one bit impressed with their new addition.

Before we knew it, the local police were called amid concerns of terror or a bomb threat. Yep, things escalated very quickly.

Four squad cars turned up, alongside plenty of plenty of jobsworths, and it was decided that the statue needed to come down… Understandable, but easier said than done!

While trying to avoid getting ourselves into any more trouble, VVD was laid back down on the truck, and it was as though it never happened. Well, except for the hundreds of photos on phones and the screening on Sky Sports News. Oops.

Since then, we’ve had an offer from a lad on Twitter who fancies erecting the defender in his back garden.

Not sure how well that one will go down amongst the neighbourhood watch, but we’re all for it.

We’d also like to add – that we worked entirely with the builders to make sure the structure was as safe as a backline containing Virgil van Dijk. We also made sure to comply fully with all police requests.

When we hoped for an explosive reaction to the stunt… This isn’t quite what we had in mind!