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Liverpool coach Arne Slot reacts at full-time following the Carabao Cup Final between Liverpool and Newcastle United at Wembley Stadium (Image: 2025 Chris Brunskill/Fantasista)

Arne Slot has admitted he thinks he got his line-up wrong for Liverpool’s Carabao Cup final loss to Newcastle United.

The Reds were poor as they fell to a 2-1 defeat to the Magpies at Wembley.

Slot made only two changes against Eddie Howe’s side from the midweek reverse to Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League as Liverpool exited the competition on penalties after a gruelling 120 minutes.



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Caoimhin Kelleher replaced Alisson Becker in goal, continuing as the Reds’ League Cup goalkeeper, while Jarell Quansah started at right-back in place of the injured Trent Alexander-Arnold.

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Since the back-to-back defeats, onlookers have suggested that the Liverpool head coach had made a mistake by not making better use of his full squad and rotating more this season.

And ahead of facing Everton, Slot admitted he felt he perhaps should have made more changes at Wembley as he admitted in hindsight that it was a mistake not to start Wataru Endo in midfield.

“Maybe, maybe, maybe I made the biggest mistake by not rotating enough,” he said.

“Not rotating enough in the line-up for Newcastle - but I thought there were four days in between, they had enough rest.

“But again it is too simple to only say we were outworked.

That is nothing to do with a sprint or tracking back or whatever, it is just conceding a corner.

“He (Endo) deserved maybe to come in if you look at the bigger picture of what he has done for the team, also in the League Cup.

“But as long as I am here now, for eight or nine months, I think you will be surprised if we are 1-0 or 2-0 down and I would have brought in a player that has hardly ever scored a goal.

In all the other occasions if we need a goal as we did, I took Ibou (Ibrahima Konate) off, put a midfielder in the last line, brought in Curtis (Jones), Ryan (Gravenberch) played as a right centre-back, Curtis started to play as a more offensive midfielder than Ryan, I brought in Harvey (Elliott) who can score a goal, I brought in Federico (Chiesa) who can score a goal, I had Darwin (Nunez) in the team, I had Cody (Gakpo) in the team, I had Mo (Mohamed Salah) in the team.

“So all the attackers were in the team and maybe I have to agree with you, that after 10 minutes I should have taken someone off to bring Wata in.

But we will never know.

“But we won against Newcastle with the ones that started, at home, and we outplayed them in the second half in Newcastle with the players that started in the final.
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