Six players who took their Carabao chance, including teenager who should start for Liverpool | OneFootball

Trey Nyoni was perhaps not the most impressive Liverpool fringe player, but he offered enough proof that he can be a starting solution soon.

These players – one from each Premier League side to play some midweek Carabao – took their chance well. These did not.

Max Dowman (Arsenal) It looks like exceptional narrative timing can be added to a burgeoning catalogue of generational attributes.

While JJ Gabriel storms upstairs, insistent that nobody understands and he’ll never call Michael Carrick his dad even if there’s a fire, a player born nine months prior – and his entourage – is showcasing far greater patience and discipline.

Of course Dowman trusts the process; he was born into it. Some see Mikel Arteta telling him to earn Arsenal minutes as a ‘warning’, but the 16-year-old accepts and embraces that as a necessary part of his footballing education.

And he continues to pass with flying colours. Arteta hailed the “outstanding” Dowman after he marked his first appearance of the season against Ipswich by becoming only the second 16-year-old to ever score twice in a game for a Premier League side.

But the Spaniard’s pointed praise of “the environment around him” underlined why Dowman is in the perfect place.

Rico Henry (Brentford) Brentford think they’re so clever, giving a 5ft 7in left-back only his fourth career start at centre-half, and first in over a decade, and winning anyway. Grow up.

Cesar Palacios (Fulham) “We have so many young players with talent,” said Alvaro Arbeloa, “and we need to be patient with them. We need to help them and develop them, but you can see the talent they have.

“The quality, they understand the game, and of course I think they will grow during this season.”

It does still feel as though he has personal stock invested in some of the speculations Fulham have made to accumulate. And as a Real Madrid academy alumnus, Palacios is emblematic of that.

The 21-year-old started the first three games of the Premier League season and even scored in the defeat to Crystal Palace, but has looked lightweight and largely ineffective, promoted and favoured beyond his apparent merit.

Fulham’s best performance of the season was not a direct result of also being the first game Palacios did not play any part in whatsoever, but it wasn’t not because of that either.

Both player and manager will thus have enjoyed Palacios scoring and assisting against West Ham, even if it did come in Fulham’s third 3-2 in six matches under Arbeloa.

Anis Mehmeti (Ipswich Town) Gary O’Neil described it as “a tough call” to leave Mehmeti out of his matchday squad for Ipswich’s season opener against Sunderland as the Albanian had “worked his socks off every day” in pre-season.

Imagine how difficult it must have been to exclude Mehmeti from his squad for the subsequent three Premier League games and Carabao second-round win over Leicester. Poor bloke.

Mehmeti attracted Championship interest in the summer but was granted a chance to impress against top-flight opposition in Arsenal and took it relatively well. A well-taken goal, plenty of energy and some otherwise neat play could even help the lucky sod make a Premier League bench.

Trey Nyoni (Liverpool) The Carabao Cup has been kind to Liverpool and their kids.

Lewis Koumas, the “contagious” line-leader so adored by Andoni Iraola for “giving everything” and setting the tone for a tireless team performance in the third-round win over Spurs, watched the 2024 final win over billion-pound bottlejobs Chelsea from the bench.

So, too, did Nyoni, who can have done little more to bolster his case for more minutes in his cameos so far.

The harsh reality for Koumas is that Premier League opportunities are likely to be limited while Alexander Isak remains fit and bubble-wrapped. But Nyoni might sense a midfield gap he can exploit as a legitimate starting option.

It did not feel like a coincidence that Alexis Mac Allister’s best performance in months coincided with being bestowed a composed, competent, ball-winning midfield partner who can read the game and pick a pass.

Liverpool conceding within seven minutes of Nyoni being taken off – the 19-year-old perhaps being rested after an hour for bigger assignments ahead – was telling.

Destiny Udogie (Tottenham) Spurs scored a goal! But it was a) from a corner and thus an indirect endorsement of Arsenal, and b) by Conor Gallagher, who the entire team must now be built around as the only proven goalscorer.

There were some other bright sparks in the defeat to Liverpool. Mateus Fernandes was decent from the bench. There was a lovely Omar Marmoush run. Mathys Tel was substituted at one point. But one straw that could be clutched came down the left.

It is wildly unfortunate that, for all his good work, Udogie’s most telling contribution to an attack was his inadvertent poke to an unmarked Mac Allister on the edge of the area. The Italian should have had a couple of assists otherwise for his actual team-mates, were it not for Spurs’ current aversion to net-breaching.

Spurs look a different side for Udogie’s presence – although his penchant for injuries does sum up one of their biggest problems.