Liverpool vs Newcastle LIVE: Carabao Cup final team news and line-ups

Liverpool will face Newcastle at 4:30pm on Sunday 16 March at Wembley Stadium.

The Carabao Cup final will be shown live on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Football.

Arne Slot can become the first Reds boss since Joe Fagan in 1984 to win the League Cup in his first season in charge.

This will be his fourth final in charge of a team, with all three previous games ending 1-0 when he was in the dugout for Feyenoord.

On the last four occasions the holders of the League Cup have reached the final, they have lifted the trophy.

Manchester United did so in 2009-10 and Manchester City did in 2018-19, 2019-20 and 2020-21.

The Liverpool centre back added: “I think the most important thing for me was the end, when we won, how the fans reacted in the stands. It was unbelievable and it’s just very nice.

“I think everyone plays football to play one day in a final. You have excitement, pressure, and we play football for that.

“At the end, when you get a good result, you can just be very happy with the fans and you can see the emotion in them. This is top.”

Dan Burn, called up to Thomas Tuchel’s first England squad on Friday, leads the Newcastle team out onto the Wembley pitch, stopping as Jamie Carragher and Gary Neville offer a handshake and a word of congratulations as he does so.

There aren’t many Newcastle fans in the stadium yet, but those set behind the goal made quite the noise as their players walked out onto the turf.

Ibrahima Konate has fond memories of playing at Wembley having won the Carabao Cup twice and the FA Cup once at the national stadium.

The France international is excited to be back and spoke to Liverpoolfc.com ahead of this afternoon’s clash.

“I’m very happy to go there again – what a stadium – and everyone who was there for the last final can realise how the fans, how the atmosphere, will be,” he said,

“I’m very happy to go again. When you win a trophy with Liverpool it’s just unbelievable. I have so many memories, all my family do as well, when we talk about the Carabao Cup and the FA Cup because I have just won these two competitions.

“But when you see the stands at the end of the game, you just have no words to describe what you can see and yes, it’s good to have this again.”

The London underground was a sea of black and white this afternoon as Newcastle fans flocked to their second Carabao Cup final in three years. With Trafalgar Square closed due to an event, the travelling Geordies were stationed at Covent Garden this afternoon soaking up the atmosphere, before making their way down Wembley Way.

They will hope to see their team end a 70-year wait for a domestic trophy.

By the early hours of Wednesday morning, Arne Slot was already thinking about ways to subtly recondition Liverpool’s focus. He wanted to make sure the players seamlessly went from the disappointment of Wednesday in the Champions League to seizing the opportunity of Sunday in the Carabao Cup final.

There were no such necessities for Newcastle United. They’ve been gearing up to this for weeks, because they’ve been waiting for such an opportunity for years.

Many at Newcastle can’t remember winning any trophy at all. Nobody needs reminding that it is 56 years since the club lifted the old Fairs Cup, which was the Europa League’s forerunner, and 70 since the FA Cup. You can sense the yearning.

Preview by Miguel Delaney

Liverpool head coach Arne Slot has no doubts about Jarell Quansah’s ability to fill in for the injured Trent Alexander-Arnold in the Carabao Cup final having seen how hard the 22-year-old has worked to recover from an early-season setback.

Alexander-Arnold is facing an extended spell on the sidelines – Slot said he would be back before the end of the season – with an ankle injury sustained in their Champions League exit to Paris St Germain on Tuesday.

It leaves Slot without a recognised right-back as Conor Bradley and Joe Gomez are still recovering from injuries of their own.

That means Quansah will most likely be asked to fill in, having lost his place as starting centre-back at half-time of the season opener at Ipswich.

Arne Slot hinted that Alisson will start against Newcastle at Wembley, rather Caoimhin Kelleher, a hero of Liverpool’s last two Carabao Cup final wins.

The Liverpool head coach was yet to tell the two goalkeepers which will play and who will be on the bench on Sunday.

“They haven’t heard it themselves but everyone that uses common sense [might guess],” said Slot. “So [look] all of our line-ups, [you] might have an idea.”

Slot turned to Alisson for the first leg of the semi-final against Tottenham, giving him just his second ever appearance in the competition but offering a sign he will bring in his first choice for the biggest games.

Kelleher has been Liverpool’s normal keeper in the Carabao Cup in recent seasons, scoring their 11th spot kick in the 2022 final shootout against Chelsea and keeping another clean sheet against the London club last year.