It all began when Enzo Fernandez’s opener gave us the lead before Liverpool’s Jarell Quansah diverted the ball into his own net in the second half. Although Liverpool pulled one back late on, it was left to Player of the Match Cole Palmer to put the icing on the cake, as he delivered from the spot with the last kick of the game.

Despite not being one of the players to etch his name onto the scoresheet, our head coach was quick to emphasise the importance of Romeo Lavia’s work against the Reds. Having endured spells on the sidelines through injury this season, Maresca believes that the Belgian's reintroduction has brought renewed energy to the squad.

‘You can see that we are a better team with Romeo,’ Maresca opened. ‘Unfortunately, he has been injured for most of the season.

‘Probably in this moment [earlier in the season], the difference between us and more clubs is that we unfortunately had many important players for us who were injured, and Romeo was one of them. No doubt Wes Fofana was another, and we had Nico out for two months.’

But it wasn’t just Lavia’s return that stood out. Maresca once again stressed the significance of the group. With several key players making contributions from the bench throughout the campaign, the Italian acknowledged the importance of unity and squad depth.

He continued: ‘We have had some players on the bench who helped us a lot this season - Reece is one of them, Tosin is one of them, Jadon was one of them - and the rest you can see in the semi-final - Kiernan was very good. If you want to fight for something, then you have to pull in the same direction.’