26 February 2024 , 11:04
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Jamie Carragher could barely believe Mauricio Pochettino's suggestion that Chelsea played for penalties during extra-time against Liverpool in the Carabao Cup final.
After 90 minutes, the game ended goalless and another 30 was on the cards. Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp was already without several key players, with Mohamed Salah, Darwin Nunez and Dominik Szoboszlai all ruled out of action with injury. And yet, the Reds manager threw on more young talent the longer the game went on and by the time the full-time whistle was blown at the end of extra time, Liverpool had three teenagers on the pitch, Bobby Clark, Jayden Danns and James McConnell.
Therefore, the Blues were favourites to win the first piece of silverware on offer this season. Instead, Virgil van Dijk's 118th-minute header dashed any hopes Pochettino would have had about winning his first trophy in English football.
The Chelsea boss looked crushed on the touchline, well aware his side had little time to respond to Liverpool taking the lead. Carragher was alongside Gary Neville on co-commentary duties and throughout the whole of extra-time, both questioned why the Blues weren't doing more to take the game to their significantly less experienced opponents.
It was a tactic that came back to bite Pochettino, though his comments during his post-match presser shed more light on the situation. The Argentine explained: "The players started to lose their energy. The team felt maybe penalties would be good for us."
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Upon seeing Pochettino's claim, Carragher took to X to write: "Wow! Felt like that watching the extra time." His assessment was a tad kinder than his colleague Neville's, who dubbed Chelsea the 'Blue billion-pound bottlejobs' at full-time.
Pochettino had that comment put to him during his media duties and responded to Neville's dig, claiming: "I didn’t hear what he said, but if you compare the age of the two groups, I think it is similar.
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"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. Of course, we made a few changes with [Conor] Gallagher and [Ben] Chilwell in extra time, it is true we didn’t keep the energy of how we finished the second half."
Pochettino went on to add that Neville is fully aware of the differences between Chelsea and Liverpool, going as far as to label the assessment from the Manchester United legend as "unfair". The 51-year-old continued: "He (Neville) knows the dynamics are completely different. I think it’s not fair to talk in this way if he said that."
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