Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk has been named the Football Supporters' Association player of the year.

More than 340,000 votes were cast by fans, with Van Dijk beating Manchester City's Raheem Sterling into second place.

The other nominations were Van Dijk's Liverpool team-mate Sadio Mane, Tottenham's Son Heung-min, Leicester striker Jamie Vardy and Arsenal's Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.

Van Dijk is the fourth Liverpool player to win the award in the last seven years, following Mohamed Salah, Philippe Coutinho and Luis Suarez."I want to say that, obviously, I'm sorry that I can't be there tonight," he said in a video message. "I'm going to be in Qatar, a trip that we obviously want to do and get the Cup for our fans and the club.

"I want to thank everyone for voting for me to be player of the year, all of the fans around the country.

"I'm very grateful to get this trophy, I just want to say thank you. It means a lot to me and hopefully I can keep doing what I'm doing and help the team and help the club."

Additional reporting by Press Association.