Liverpool's significantly undermanned young team defeated an even more youthful Chelsea side that was grappling with almost as many injuries.

February 26, 2024

Liverpool's significantly undermanned young team defeated an even more youthful Chelsea side that was grappling with almost as many injuries.

Liverpool managed to secure victory at Wembley despite facing an injury crisis and relying on their younger players. In contrast, Chelsea's traditionally older squad, despite being at full strength, failed to perform successfully.

Credit to Gary Neville for coining a commentary line that perfectly encapsulated the essence of the 2024 Carabao Cup final and shaped the narrative surrounding it: "Klopp’s kids against the blue billion-pound bottle-jobs." Despite Chelsea using 15 players with a lower average age (23.5) and median age (23) than the 17 Liverpool players (24 for both average and median age), the focus remains on the context of Liverpool's youth being academy-developed, in contrast to Chelsea's expensive assembly. John Cross in the Daily Mirror highlights the narrative that Chelsea's £1 billion squad couldn't defeat an injury-hit Liverpool, emphasizing the Reds' ten missing players due to injuries.

Liverpool is undeniably grappling with an injury crisis, which was exacerbated during and after their triumph. However, it's essential to note that Chelsea faced their own challenges, dealing with similar issues throughout the season. In the Carabao Cup final, eight Chelsea players were sidelined, including Thiago Silva, their most senior and experienced player. While Liverpool managed and coped with their injury concerns more effectively, Chelsea was not exempt from being "injury-hit." Oliver Holt, in the Daily Mail, criticizes Chelsea's "collection of record signings and extravagant busts" and individuals who don't function as a cohesive team. He commends Liverpool's "bunch of kids and a couple of giants" who stood out, emphasizing the collective effort over age statistics.

Indeed, Liverpool featured several young players, a fact shared by Chelsea, even though Alan Shearer never faced Levi Colwill's father. However, the perception was that Chelsea, with "World Cup winners and walking pay-packets," possessed more experience. Interestingly, both Liverpool and Chelsea had an equal number of World Cup winners, and they ranked fifth and fourth, respectively, for the highest Premier League wage bills.

The coverage predominantly emphasizes Liverpool's "severely depleted" status, overlooking Chelsea's injury concerns. The term "kids" is used 14 times to describe the older of the two teams. Chris Bascombe, writing in the Daily Telegraph, celebrates Liverpool's "circumstance-defying" victory. He highlights Virgil van Dijk's role in channeling Steven Gerrard and refusing to accept defeat against opponents with greater experience, pedigree, reputation, massive salaries, and transfer fees, particularly referring to Chelsea.

"But while the prior finals between these two clubs – Liverpool securing both domestic cups after defeating Chelsea in 2022 – were deemed dull and boring, this one proved gripping and exciting until the bitter end," remarked John Cross in the Daily Mirror. The statement about the 2022 FA and League Cup finals being dull and boring is disputed, as they were characterized by various elements and were certainly not perceived as lacking excitement.

"The Kids are alright

In The Sun, Dave Kidd largely avoids the dominant themes and instead goes for the most low-hanging of all fruits: VAR.

‘That mistake was evened up by a dodgy offside call which ruled out a Raheem Sterling goal.

Palmer’s through-ball fed Jackson, who squared for Sterling to find the net.

But Jackson was flagged offside and despite the Chelsea striker looking to be onside, Brooks again refused to get involved.

He ‘refused to get involved’? What on earth are you on about? The offside was checked and confirmed to be an incredibly marginal but excellent call by the fourth official.

And he didn’t ‘refuse to get involved’ with Moises Caicedo’s awful tackle on Ryan Gravenberch; the VAR cannot intervene on perceived yellow-card offences so literally the only thing Brooks could have done was recommend a red card, and he deemed it reckless rather than serious foul play, and thus not worthy of such punishment.

There were more than enough interesting strands of discussion to pursue from that final before laying into the officials for a) correctly disallowing a goal for offside, and b) deciding a probable yellow-card offence was not a red-card offence. But VAR = bad – even though it was widely accepted the problem in those instances if anyone was referee Chris Kavanagh – so crack on.

Poch on the belt

Back to the Neville ‘bottlejobs’ quote, Pochettino was inevitably asked about it post-match and had this to say:

I have a good relationship with Gary and I don’t know if that’s how I can take this opinion. But I respect his opinion. [Neville] knows the dynamics are completely different. I think it’s not fair to talk in this way, if he said that.

And that obviously spawned the following headlines:

‘Mauricio Pochettino bites back at Gary Neville “billion-pound bottle jobs” jibe’ – Daily Mirror."

‘Mauricio Pochettino hits back at Gary Neville’s ‘billion pound bottlejobs’ jibe after Chelsea lose Carabao Cup final’ – The Sun.

‘Mauricio Pochettino bites back at Gary Neville after the Man United legend called Chelsea ‘billion pound bottle jobs’ for losing the Carabao Cup final to Jurgen Klopp’s injury-hit Liverpool’ – MailOnline, who get top marks for including ‘injury-hit Liverpool’ again.

‘Pochettino hits back at Gary Neville’s Chelsea ‘billion-pound bottle jobs’ jibe’ – The Guardian.

”Not fair’ – Chelsea boss Mauricio Pochettino fires back at Gary Neville’s scathing ‘billion pound bottle jobs’ criticism after Carabao Cup final defeat to Liverpool’ – Goal.com.

‘Pochettino hits back at ‘unfair’ Neville after ‘blue billion pound bottlejobs’ jibe in Liverpool loss‘ – Football36…ah bollocks.

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