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With a 4-0 victory over Tottenham on Thursday, Liverpool overcame a first-leg deficit to reach the League Cup final, increasing the pressure on Spurs manager Ange Postecoglou.

The Reds, who will face Newcastle at Wembley on March 16 for their first silverware of the English season, had Cody Gakpo, Mohamed Salah, Dominik Szoboszlai, and Virgil van Dijk on target.

In their ideal debut season, Liverpool are on par for a quadruple.

They are currently six points clear of the Premier League’s top teams, have advanced to the Champions League’s last 16, and will travel to Plymouth, a Championship rival, on Sunday in the FA Cup fourth round.

“To reach a final should always be special”, said Slot. “Our side did a very good job,” he said.

On the other hand, Spurs continue to struggle with their trophy drought. Postecoglou now has one more chance to fulfill his promise to win a trophy in his second season, after Tottenham last won silverware in 2008.

If Spurs, who are 14th in the Premier League, lose to Aston Villa in the FA Cup on Saturday, there is a possibility that the Australian will be whisked out.

“We have given up a good opportunity tonight and we cannot shy away from that”, said Postecoglou. They performed far better as a team. They “weren’t good enough for us.”

With Caoimhin Kelleher taking the place of Alisson Becker, Slot named his strongest team in charge of the League Cup despite having more glamorous titles to win.

Tottenham’s injured defense was forced right in by new signing Kevin Danso, and Mathys Tel made an early start off the bench as a result of Richarlison’s injury-prone recovery.

In light of their 1-0 first-leg defeat in north London last month, Liverpool had scored four in each of their previous two matches at Anfield. The two sides then combined to score four goals in the process.

Liverpool onslaught&nbsp,

After Szoboszlai ran offside before sweeping home Salah’s pass, the home side had found their stride in the first quarter.

Spurs couldn’t escape when Gakpo scored the next delivery into the box to surpass him as the top scorer in the competition this season with five goals.

With a fine save moments later, Antonin Kinsky kept Salah waiting for his goal, but Richarlison lay prone to abandon Postecoglou’s team, leaving them even more underwhelmed.

Tottenham never looked capable of putting up the threat they needed to survive the Liverpool siege without the signings of Dominic Solanke, Brennan Johnson, James Maddison, Timo Werner, and Wilson Odobert in attacking positions.

Five minutes into the second half, Kinsky sprinted off his line before being caught by Darwin Nunez, who had sprinted off the ball.

Salah scored his 26th goal of the season with ruthlessly squandering the resulting penalty into the top corner.

As Liverpool put their foot down, Gakpo and Ryan Gravenberch fired the winner.

The killer third goal came 15 minutes from time when Connor Bradley, who excelled in the absence of the injured Trent Alexander-Arnold, played in Szoboszlai to slot home.

Van Dijk then pointed in the fourth from a corner to rub salt in the visitors’ wounds, opening up the struggles Spurs had defending set-pieces.

After a remarkable 4-0 aggregate humbling of Arsenal in the other semi-final, Newcastle are on the verge of putting an end to their 56-year quest for a major trophy.

However, if they want to stop Slot’s juggernaut, the Magpies must do so in an unviable way.

In the German Cup quarter-finals on Wednesday, Victor Boniface scored an extra-time winner as Bayer Leverkusen fought back from two goals down to defeat derby rivals Cologne 3-1.

Leverkusen were anticipating a dominant performance against their division rivals, but they were soon two goals up early as Damion Downs and Linton Maina both scored either way into the half-time lead.

With 30 minutes left, Florian Wirtz assisted Patrik Schick to start a comeback effort, marking Florian Wirtz’s first loss in the competition since July 2022.

In stoppage time, Schick headed home with a header in the seventh minute to bring the game to extra time.

For the first time this season, Boniface, who is playing alongside fellow striker Schick, stubbed onto an Alex Grimaldo cross to put his side on the verge of victory.

Imad Rondic scored in the 113th minute in Cologne, but his goal was overturned after a narrow offside was reviewed by VAR.

“It was a very hard game against an opponent who did very well, but we showed a good reaction”, Leverkusen coach Xabi Alonso told reporters.

“We showed heart and belief even though it may not have been our best game,” he said. We fought until the last minute, with patience and kept our structure. We’re happy”.

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Cologne finished second in the Bundesliga 2 with more than half of the season played, despite being dropped from the top division last campaign.

After 10 minutes of stoppage time in the first half, Downs capitalized on some sloppy Leverkusen defense to blast into the bottom left corner.

Downs found Maina in an enormous space in the first half, and the winger beat Matej Kovar to give Cologne a second half lead.

In the ninth consecutive game this season, the German has assisted the Czech with an assist after finding Schick on the 61st minute to cut Cologne’s lead.

The German champions once more made it late with a cross in stoppage time with 18 goals after the 90th minute in all competitions during Leverkusen’s remarkable run in the 2023-24 season.

With Cologne reeling, Boniface, who was cleared for a move to Saudi Arabia in January before a last-minute U-turn, was first to a Grimaldo cross to put Leverkusen in the lead.

A late equalizer was ruled out by VAR for the narrowest of offsides, but Köln rallied.

The win means Leverkusen, who put out Bayern Munich in the last round, join Stuttgart, who beat Augsburg 1-0 on Tuesday, in the semi-finals.

Later in February, two-time winners RB Leipzig host 2015 winners Wolfsburg while Werder Bremen, who have lifted the trophy on six occasions, play at home against third-division Arminia Bielefeld.

As Cristiano Ronaldo celebrates his 40th birthday on Wednesday in his new home country of Saudi Arabia, his playing days may be over, but his fans are bigger than ever.

The Portuguese legend, who signed a deal for $250 million from Al Nasr in Riyadh two years ago, made an appearance in exchange for an end-of-career salary for football obscurity.

However, when he was joined by a slew of aging superstars, including Neymar and Karim Benzema, to the Saudi Pro League, where he had a big-money influence, it became obvious.

Saudi Arabia was then awarded the 2034 World Cup in December, the crowning glory for the oil-rich kingdom’s strategy of revamping its image through sports, tourism and culture.

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Ronaldo, a Saudi World Cup ambassador and current online sensation with more than a billion followers on his social media channels, is in charge.

Ronaldo’s YouTube channel, which he launched in August, attracted 20 million subscribers in 90 minutes and a whopping 20 million in just 24 hours. He currently possesses 73. 5 million.

While Ronaldo’s perfect white teeth, bulging torso and product promotions are ubiquitous online, he remains equally energetic on the pitch.

He berates his own and his team-mates’ errors as much as he would if he were still playing El Clasico for Real Madrid on Monday, including a trademark leaping header.

According to Simon Chadwick, professor of sport and geopolitical economy at Skema Business School, “one’s physical prowess diminishes as one gets older, so it would have been simple for Ronaldo to take Saudi Arabian money and gradually fade from view.”

“However, the gusto and passion that he continues to display suggests a consummate professional, deeply passionate player, and a physically determined athlete, the likes of which we don’t commonly see,” he added.

Stay, go or retire

Records still hang in front of the five-time Ballon d’Or and Champions League winner, though he is likely far from achieving World Cup glory, in contrast to his Argentine rival Lionel Messi’s.

In September he passed 900 professional goals, an unmatched feat in official matches. Now on 923, and with a record 35 Saudi Pro League goals last season, the hallowed 1,000 is not too far away.

Ronaldo has yet to capture a Saudi or continental trophy with Al Nassr despite his only success with the club being the Arab Club Champions Cup of 2023.

With no word on whether he will extend his time there until his contract expires in June, questions are now raised about his future.

Stay, go or retire, he has indelibly changed football in the desert country, while managing to grow his own brand at the same time.

His presence, according to Egyptian TV football analyst Omar Nassef, was undoubtedly crucial for the Saudi bid for the World Cup, especially given his unwavering support for Saudi Arabia.

Ronaldo’s presence “made it possible for players from world-class clubs to join the Saudi league.”

It’s not just about the money; it’s also about getting into a league with one of the world’s top players. ”