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Newcastle United lifted the Carabao Cup trophy following a 2-1 win over Liverpool at Wembley - with goals from Dan Burn and Alexander Isak the difference between the sides.
Burn’s opener, on the stroke of half-time, sent 32,000 in black-and-white into absolute ecstasy as they celebrated Newcastle United’s first ever goal at the new Wembley. Isak, as he has done so many times this season, popped up with a crucial second goal to put the tie, at least at that point, to bed.
Even after a late Federico Chiesa goal, the Magpies were resilient and ensured that, this time, they would be the ones leaving Wembley in celebration. For Liverpool, though, it was a 90 minutes that saw them dominated by the Magpies with Burn’s opener coming at a crucial time in the contest.
Arne Slot explains Dan Burn/Alexis Mac Allister decision
As Kieran Trippier placed the ball on the quadrant, the Sky Sports cameras zoomed into the face of Burn as they picked him out as Newcastle United’s dangerman. It wouldn’t take a genius to pick the huge frame of Burn out as a weapon from set-pieces and whilst his header, planted into the bottom corner from some range, was a brilliant effort, it was Liverpool’s decision to have Burn marked by Alexis Mac Allister, a man considerably smaller than the former Darlington defender, that surprised many.
Slot, unsurprisingly, was asked about that after the match: “Again, credit to Newcastle but I can explain.” A sombre Slot responded. “We play zonal.
“We have five players zonally close to our goal and it the ball falls there, it is always one of the five players going to attack the ball and we have three players that man-mark and Macca is one of them.
“Normally a player like Dan Burn runs to the zone because normally, and I think he is an exception because I have never seen in my life, a player from that far away heading a ball with so much force into the far corner. That is part of logic that either they have to go far away from our zone which 99 out of a 100 times will never lead to a goal or they have to arrive in our zone and then it's an equal level, if you call if like this.
“Credit to him, he is one of the few players who can score a goal from that distance with his head.”
Dan Burn’s stunning week
For Burn though, this will be a week that will forever be etched in history. Not only did he, a boyhood fan of the club, score the opening goal in a victorious cup final, but he will leave Wembley as a potential England international. Burn was called-up by Thomas Tuchel for matches against Albania and Latvia later this month with the 32-year-old potentially set for his international debut in those games.
Although that will come after the celebrations have died down with Burn front and centre of a lot of those videos - he even recreated his dressing room dance at Wembley.