Chelsea 0-1 Liverpool Stats: EFL Cup Final

 Virgil van Dijk headed home deep into extra-time to win the EFL Cup for Jürgen Klopp’s young Liverpool side in a helter-skelter final against Chelsea at Wembley.

The Liverpool centre-back thought he’d scored a header in normal time, only for VAR to controversially rule his goal out as Wataru Endō was adjudged to have interfered with play from an offside position during a free-kick.

The win is Liverpool’s 10th EFL Cup trophy – the Reds already had more than any other team – while Chelsea became the first team to lose six consecutive major English domestic cup finals.

• Liverpool have won the League Cup for the 10th time – the most by any team in the history of the competition. Two of those have come under current manager Jürgen Klopp, with only Bob Paisley (3) winning it more often in charge of the Reds.
• Chelsea have lost in each of their last three League Cup finals (2019, 2022 and 2024) – this after only losing two of their first seven finals in the competition between 1965 and 2015.
• 
  
• Chelsea boss Mauricio Pochettino has only won one of his 14 games as a manager against Jürgen Klopp (D5 L8), going winless in eight matches since recording his only such victory (Spurs 4-1 Liverpool in October 2017).
• Liverpool have gone to extra-time in each of their last five League Cup finals (2005, 2012, 2016, 2022 and 2024), as well as in nine of their 11 final matches in the competition played at Wembley.
• Liverpool’s winner – scored by Virgil Van Dijk in the 118th minute – was the latest winning goal scored in a League Cup final since Aston Villa’s Brian Little in the 1977 final (119th minute v Everton).
• 
  
• Virgil Van Dijk scored in consecutive games for the first time in his Liverpool career (vs Luton and Chelsea), with today’s final being his 252nd appearance for the club.
• In the form of Ryan Gravenberch (21), Conor Bradley (20), and Harvey Elliott (20), Liverpool started three players aged 21 or younger in a major final for the very first time in the club’s history.
• Jayden Danns (18), Bobby Clark (19) and James McConnell (19) all featured for Liverpool in this final – the most teenagers to appear in a League Cup final for a team since Arsenal in 2007 (four – Walcott, Fabregas, Denilson and Traore).
• Enzo Fernández made his 50th start for Chelsea across all competitions, the most starts by any player for the Blues since his club debut in February 2023.
• Liverpool have made 217 changes to their starting XI across all competitions this season, 54 more than the Premier League team with the next most line-up changes (Manchester City, 163).