'LOVE Beating Them On Pens!' | Liverpool 1-1 Chelsea (Pens: 6-5) | Maych's Match Reaction

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

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SPEAKER_2 (0:36)

Woo, Liverpool going through to the quarter finals of the Cannabalfa on penalties over Chelsea. What is it about us and Chelsea on penalties? They need me too rhythmically and have done consistently over the years.

Paul Machin (0:52)

Too much, too many pins, and my leg's stolen by one of the largest penalty shootouts against Chelsea. But here we are, it's another one. And once again, it's one in which we've come out on top. Absolutely stunning, stunning, stunning, stunning. Not a high quality game of football by any stretch.

SPEAKER_2 (1:12)

Let me get on a circus, it's going to get copyright struck. Thank you to whoever copyrighted the Never Walk Alone on YouTube.

Paul Machin (1:32)

Makes it impossible for anyone in the Liverpool space to use that song.

Look, brilliant, Joe Gomez, Joe Gomez, Joe Gomez. At last, I know what Tep Leeds has encountered, breaking his duck, but ask me if I've asked. Go on, ask me in the comments. I had asked for, no, I'm not. Maybe this season he will get the actual one, but you know what, I'll take that for now.

SPEAKER_2 (1:54)

Yeah, wow.

Paul Machin (1:56)

The game itself, two tired teams, it looks like it reminded me a bit of Villarreal, but with a little bit more faith. And actually what we had against Villarreal was ultimately, I joke, but we had a little bit more attacking quality when we brought the changes in.

SPEAKER_2 (2:14)

It added to our game.

Paul Machin (2:16)

And actually, I don't think the change of substitutions really added loads to us tonight. It actually did. Chelsea's subs made them a bit better. What I will say, actually, in terms of the endeavor in the first half, James McConnell again, Louis Kumas again, coming in, putting a mega shift in for the team, really, really impressed by them. And it's funny that they almost end up in a set.

Almost end up in a separate category now, to Rio and to Trey, who are just absolutely brilliant. They're just like on the verge of becoming their first team players. But they displayed the right level of what we were looking for from this game. And actually, weirdly enough, so much credit to Cody Gaffa for taking the penalty and scoring the penalty.

SPEAKER_2 (2:59)

But around that, he had a real struggle.

Paul Machin (3:01)

In fact, credit for then stepping up and taking another penalty in the shootout as well. And I was worried for that one because Gaffa had a real struggle all game long. He was getting into a lot of the right areas, but his final ball was lacking or his touch really let him down. And it was funny because obviously it's the League Cup.

SPEAKER_2 (3:17)

You can't go hard in the League Cup.

Paul Machin (3:18)

You've got to rest and rotate because the Arsenal game was huge in the weekend. I think our approach was just about right. If we'd had a few more players, we would have rotated a few more, I think.

But if Alex Izak was being played in with the chances that Gaffa was getting played in with, we could have walked away with that game in the first half and it never quite materialised because, yeah, heavy touch here and there. But again, how can you criticise a player who stepped up into crunch clutch moments and delivered from the penalty spot? So, yeah, weird one for Gaffa. He hasn't quite come back right since the injury because he was flying free and I really hope this was a game to get him back onto fitness, back onto speed and we could see Gaffa back to what he was at the start of the season, moving forward from this.

Just absolutely eating everything up, eating attacks up for his dinner, yum, yum, yum and thinking nothing of it. Joe Gomez again, good defensive performance from him. Virgil van Dijk, they brought that lad on up front, just part of them for no reason whatsoever. Played a straight red type situation, but he had a little wear with Jacque and went, go and do it for me mate. And Jacque went and did them a little bit later on, just by being better at him, a better football and physical defender than he was. So that was really good to see, really, really good to see. But yeah, take it. You know, there are plenty of things that you would like to see improve for Liverpool, but again, given the rest of the rotation we were doing, but it's just about in the best possible situation we can have for the Arsenal game at the weekend. Look, one thing I will say, and I didn't really want to say it while there was loads of noise going on around, I found the booing of Jordan Henderson distasteful. Now I've got no problem with booing Chelsea players, right? So boo him as a Chelsea player. If you're going to boo everyone, boo everyone, but I didn't like the targeted booing of him. Again, distasteful is the way I find it. Maybe it's a slightly older generation thing, I don't know. And look again, it feels like all better off when it comes to boos.