(Football news) Liverpool make their way back to their Merseyside home after defeating Chelsea 1-0 in extra time in the EFL Cup final, while Millwall defeated the Saints 2-1 in Saturday’s Championship match.

Since signing his first contract with the Reds, Jurgen Klopp has carefully placed seven pieces of silverware into the Liverpool cabinet, including his first Premier League title and sixth Champions League crown. However, the German manager is leaving after leading his team to an EFL Cup victory over a timid Chelsea, calling it the most “special” honor of his managerial career thus far.

Klopp’s admission came after 120 minutes of unmissable action on the Wembley soil, where yet another final between Liverpool and Chelsea would seemingly be decided from the dreaded 12-yard mark, only for Virgil van Dijk to come up with the captain’s contribution of all captain’s contributions, heading in the cup-clinching goal 118 minutes in.

Already without a full XI of stricken players and seeing two more enforcers depart on crutches, a decimated Liverpool – who ended the match with a handful of teenage academy products on the field – may still be licking their wounds of their Wembley warfare, but nothing that can quell the jubilation of a record-extending 10th EFL Cup success.

The celebrations among Klopp’s crop must die down in a matter of hours, though, as Wednesday sees Liverpool bid to go beyond the fifth round of the FA Cup for just the second time in the last nine seasons; on the only previous occasion that they have done so since 2015, the 2021-22 crown travelled home with them.

Arsenal and Norwich City have already succumbed to Liverpool’s FA Cup excellence this year, and the beating of Chelsea also represented a fourth win on the bounce across all tournaments for the Premier League leaders, who ended a seven-game run without a clean sheet by keeping Mauricio Pochettino’s meek men at bay.

Over the final weekend of February, Liverpool’s excitement and Southampton’s dejection clashed when Russell Martin’s team lost to Neil Harris’s Millwall on Saturday, their third straight loss at home in the Championship and their second straight loss overall.

Four days after Hull City defeated Southampton 2-1 at St Mary’s, Southampton lost by the same scoreline as a result of goals from Japhet Tanganga and Zian Flemming, who came off of a header from Che Adams in the first half. This result left Martin’s team five points outside of the automatic promotion spots.

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