How Newcastle’s Dan Burn hit Liverpool with a sneak attack in Carabao Cup final | OneFootball

“It’s been coming.”

That line could have applied to a lot of things from Sunday’s Carabao Cup final: Newcastle United‘s win, Liverpool’s physical and mental stumbles, a final that isn’t Liverpool vs Chelsea.

But none of those felt more apt than the Newcastle goal itself, and the looming figure of Dan Burn, who kept coming, and coming, and coming, before the Red Wall couldn’t stand it any longer. Inevitability came all in one big gangly basket.

By definition though, if something is inevitable, there are warning signs. To analyse how inevitable the goal was, it’s worth looking at the red flags lining its landing path: to judge how well Newcastle hid their intentions, and to judge how blindly Liverpool wandered into danger.

Red Flag No.1 – First-degree Burn(s)

The largest sign of inevitability was perhaps Newcastle’s obsession with Dan Burn against Liverpool. Burn was the target of five of Newcastle six first-half corners — suggested by the cross locations and general squad movements around him. Newcastle don’t necessarily give away all their tricks at once, but much like Gabriel for Arsenal or Harry Maguire for England, Burn is the guy.

First, they aimed for the near post, with Burn looping round the wider Liverpool zonal cluster to get his great long noggin onto the ball. The front post has reliably been a pitfall of Liverpool all the way back to Jurgen Klopp, and Caoimhin Kelleher notably struggles in coming through stacked boxes to claim, so it made sense to give it a try. Newcastle repeated this strategy on their third corner, with Burn trying to sneak in ahead of Kelleher, but it was to no avail.

Newcastle really thrived against Liverpool with back-post corners, making use of Kieran Trippier’s deep, driven deliveries to dime it onto the dome of Dan — ideally heading back into the mixer for a ‘drifter’ to come and pick up the scraps. The Magpies did this twice before the goal. All the exact same move, with Burn floating at the edge of the 18-yard box, and all relatively unchallenged. The fact that Liverpool didn’t adapt to this is strange and frankly bad. Burn was proving to be the only man Newcastle set-piece strategist and psychologist’s dream Jason Tindall cared about, and Liverpool shrugged their shoulders.

Red Flag No.2 – Deep problems

By shrugging their shoulders, I primarily mean that Liverpool weren’t reactive to these issues: rather, they were proactive, with a structure that ideally beefed up Newcastle’s hit zones beforehand.

Below you can see how they looked: a packed front-post, majority in the 6-yard box, with a few drifting man-to-man on the edge.

And it worked! For a bit. The front-post emphasis meant it shut off the Burn sneak-ins, and ensured that Burn’s contact realistically had to come from the fringes of the box. Added to that, Newcastle have previously showed expert talent at using quick wide interplay to nicely earn space in the box. Here, Liverpool shut that down instantly, earning a free-kick by having Diogo Jota and Andrew Robertson ready to jump on the taker and his Magpie mate.

However, I did say “for a bit”. As you’ll notice, astute reader, Liverpool are very deep here – the entirety of their defensive structure relies upon the ball going to their big burly lads and not on the outskirts. Newcastle avert this issue constantly by going for an out-and-in motion: hitting Burn far, then utilising the Liverpool push out from this deep point to find gaps, benefitted by corner structure not matching your typical back four. This gives two big chances for Bruno Guimaraes, as he fills in between wandering centre-backs. Liverpool don’t move out to fix this, they stick to their guns, and give Burn the freedom of Wembley.

Red Flag No.3 – Alexis isn’t a Big Mac

The final point is perhaps the most logical. While Liverpool didn’t move out, this could be seen as smart – don’t afford that costly front post spot, ensure Burn has to shoot from 15 yards, keep Virgil van Dijk central. However, where they hurt themselves and make it a matter of time is by leaving Alexis Mac Allister as Burn’s sole stopper. Mac Allister is 5’9″ and wins 42.1% of his aerial duels. Dan Burn is 6’7″, and wins 64.3%. It’s quite stupid.

Placing a 10-inch and 22% negative differential as your only route out of significant aerial trouble makes this situation a ticking timebomb. Even a physical presence of someone like Dominick Szoboszlai could have reduced the speed at which Burn could approach, forcing worse angles and worse power redirection. Or, quite simply, meaning Burn has to produce an even better header than he already did.

This move, in the 24th, 40th and, eventually, 45th minute, was Liverpool’s undoing. Isolate the big man, and give him a run while you’re at it.

It’s a lot of consistent overlooks from Liverpool that really did make it a matter of time. While we must credit Newcastle for the impressive variety and lock-picking skills, Liverpool’s insistence on presenting them the same padlock every time should be appropriately judged.

Newcastle couldn’t have made it clearer where they were heading, however, to bastardise a line from Bojack Horseman: when you’re wearing Liverpool-coloured glasses, all the red flags just look like flags.