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Mohamed Salah (left) missed his Liverpool team-mate Trent Alexander-Arnold in the Carabao Cup final defeat to Newcastle United, says Paul Scholes (right)

Even the most ardent of Liverpool supporter would have no complaints about the outcome of Sunday's Carabao Cup final.

Newcastle United ran out winners and deservedly so.

The 2-1 loss ensured a bad week for Liverpool got worse.



His side are 12 points clear at the top of the Premier League with nine games left to play.

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Hold their nerve and the title will be returning to Merseyside for the first time since 2020 - and this time it will be celebrated in front of fans.

But with a long, 17-day await until Liverpool's next match, at home to city rivals Everton on April 2, the questions about what went wrong against Newcastle continue.

Were the Reds physically and mentally drained after what happened against PSG?

Only the players can honestly answer that.

Tactically, Liverpool certainly allowed the Magpies the play the type of game they excel at, while there is no doubt that the best player in the 2024-25 Premier League campaign, Mohamed Salah, was unable to influence proceedings.

The Egyptian superstar has been nothing short of sensational so far this season, scoring 32 goals and registering 22 assists in all competitions.

But against Newcastle, Salah set an unwanted record.

Touching the ball just 23 times, the 32-year-old failed to attempt a single shot or create a chance for a team-mate.

And according to Opta, that was the first in his Reds career that has happened when he has played the entire 90 minutes of a match.

Indeed, it wasn't until the arrival of the substitutes that Liverpool began to threaten, with Federico Chiesa's late goal setting up a nervy finale for a Newcastle side who had led comfortably up until that point through Dan Burn's towering header and Alexander Isak's razor-sharp finish.

And when assessing the Reds' performance, Manchester United legend Paul Scholes pointed to the absence of Trent Alexander-Arnold for Salah's struggles.

Alexander-Arnold was sidelined with the injury he sustained in the second-leg loss to PSG and as a result, a Newcastle team missing first-choice left-back Lewis Hall, as well as the left-sided centre-back Sven Botman, comfortably dealt with the threat down the opposition right.

"I think Liverpool were missing Trent, which you don't normally say about a right-back," Scholes said on The Overlap Fan Debate, brought to you by Sky Bet.

You felt the warning signs most of the way and though they had to change something."

Alexander-Arnold is expected to return before the campaign is out but his long-term future remains mired in uncertainty.

Like top-scorer Salah and captain Virgil van Dijk, the vice-captain's contract runs out at the end of the season and it is well-documented that Real Madrid, the reigning European champions, want to sign him on a free transfer after having a bid for his services turned down in January.

If Alexander-Arnold wants to join up with his England team-mate and friend Jude Bellingham, Liverpool would be powerless to prevent him doing that.

Former Manchester City defender, Micah Richards, speaking on The Rest Is Football podcast, offered a similar verdict to Scholes about Sunday.

He said: "They just didn't have the same flow they usually have.
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