Unrecognizable Liverpool suffers a 3-0 elimination in the EFL cup, also known as the League Cup or the Carabao cup due to sponsorship reasons, by Crystal Palace on Wednesday in the fourth round of the tournament, striking crisis at Anfield.
The English football club is in crisis, dropping from top of the table to the seventh position in the Premier League losing all their last 4 matches in a row, losing in the Champions League and now being eliminated from the Carabao Cup by Crystal Palace trashing them 3-0 at home. A brace by Ismaila Sarr struck twice in the first half and Yeremy Pino grabbed the third shot to condemn Arne Slot’s sixth defeat with Liverpool FC.
The defeats were against Brentford (3-2) Premier League, Manchester United (2-1) Premier League, Chelsea (2-1) Premier League, Galatasaray (1-0) Champions League and Crystal Palace (2-1) Premier League.
London’s Crystal Palace have been their nemesis for the third time this season. Arne Slot underestimated Crystal Palace in the competition, the Dutch manager made ten changes in the lineup compared to the team last weekend. Slot built a weakened lineup as he chose to prioritize Liverpool’s big games against Aston Villa, Real Madrid, and Manchester City over the next two weeks.
Virgil van Dijk, Ibrahima Konaté, Dominik Szoboszlai, Cody Gakpo, Florian Wirtz, Mohamed Salah and Hugo Ekitike were all benched, and instead Slot trusted mostly on young players like 17-year-old winger Rio Ngumoha, who recently became the youngest Premier League scorer, or 18-year-old Amara Nallo who saw a straight red card in the 79th minute.
Arne Slot commented after the defeat: “Our is probably not as big as people think it is, This club has always chosen the League Cup to give time to the young academy talent and then there has not been a change in the way we look at this”.
“I saw Manchester City starting eleven and they didn’t have one starter from the weekend, but it felt like their best team, At the same time then after I made two substitutions tonight, we had six teenagers on the pith in total”.
With the team’s drastic fall in the table, Liverpool face three giants in the next two weeks: Aston Villa on Sunday, Real Madrid on Tuesday and Manchester City on Sunday. Could these three matches decide Arne Slot’s future with Liverpool?
Written by: Atin Kevin Fernandez