We’re down to four teams in this year’s edition of the Carabao Cup with teams just two matches away from a trip to Wembley.
Newcastle United host Arsenal on Wednesday with a 2-0 aggregate lead from the semifinal first leg at Emirates Stadium. The Magpies are bidding to reach the final for the second time in three seasons, while the Gunners hope to produce a comeback and play in the trophy match for the first time since 2018.
The second semifinal sees Tottenham attempt to defend a 1-0 lead against Liverpool, who will host Ange Postecoglou’s team at Anfield hoping to keep alive their bid for an unprecedented quadruple in English football.
But aside from the trophy itself, winning the Carabao Cup can be important to a team’s ambitions.
MORE: All-time Carabao Cup winners | Date and time of 2025 final
Do Carabao Cup winners qualify for Europa League?
The winners of the Carabao Cup in 2025 will not qualify automatically for the Europa League. Instead, as with the 2023/24 tournament, the winners will earn a place in the playoff round of the UEFA Conference League.
However, this can be overridden depending whether that team’s finishing place in the Premier League, or success in another tournament, pushes them into a superior continental competition.
If the Carabao Cup winners also finish in the top four (or possibly top five, depending on UEFA coefficient rankings) of the Premier League — something that has been the case in every season since 2017 — they will automatically qualify for the UEFA Champions League. If the Carabao Cup winner comes in fifth place or wins the FA Cup, they are automatically entered into the Europa League group stage.
In the above cases, the Europa Conference League playoff place awarded to the Carabao Cup winner will then be passed on to the highest-placed team in the Premier League not already qualified for the Champions League or Europa League (sixth or seventh place).
What do Carabao Cup runners-up qualify for?
The Carabao Cup runners-up do not qualify for any UEFA competitions by virtue of only reaching the final, even if the tournament winners end up qualifying for a better European competition by the other means described above.
If the Carabao Cup winner finishes in the top five, that means the Conference League playoff berth that comes with winning the trophy will be transferred to the next highest Premier League team not already qualified to European competition (in sixth or seventh place).
What is the Carabao Cup prize money?
The Carabao Cup winners in 2025 will be awarded £100,000 (approximately $125,000), with the runners-up pocketing £50,000 (approx. $62,600).
This amounts to small change when compared to the sums on offer for Premier League finishing spots and it is also considerably less than teams can win in the FA Cup.
Lowest-ranked teams to win the League Cup
During the competition’s maiden decade in the 1960s, there were two instances of clubs from the third tier beating top division clubs in the final. In 1967, Queens Park Rangers came from 2-0 down to beat holders West Brom 3-2, while two years later Swindon Town stunned Arsenal on a bog of a Wembley pitch 3-1.
There has been nothing to match those heroics in the modern day, although League Two Bradford City completed an astonishing run to the 2013 final despite operating in the fourth tier of English football. The Bantams were beaten 4-0 in the final by Swansea City, then in the Premier League.
The advent of squad rotation in the 1990s — Alex Ferguson’s decision to field a youthful Manchester United side that was dispatched by York City famously prompted questions in Parliament — opened up opportunities for sides not always synonymous with winning major honours.
Leicester City were winners in 1997 and 2000, beating lower-league opposition in the form of Tranmere Rovers in the latter final, while the Foxes were beaten finalists in 1999. Middlesbrough lost the 1997 and 1998 finals before Gareth Southgate (below) captained them to glory in 2004 with a 2-1 win over Bolton Wanderers.
Boro then embarked upon a run to the last 16 of the UEFA Cup in 2004/05, reaching the final the following season. Other unheralded League Cup winners have not made the same impression in Europe.
Birmingham City stunned Arsenal in the 2011 League Cup final but did not get out of the Europa League group stage the following season, albeit having been relegated from the Premier League in the meantime. Swansea fared slightly better in 2013/14, emerging from their group before losing to Napoli in the first knockout round.
If squad rotation opened the door to surprise winners at one point, the ever-increasing wealth and squad depth of the Premier League’s heavyweights has since all but closed it. In the 12 years since Swansea beat Bradford, the cup has gone to members of the ‘big six’, with Manchester City winning six times during this period, Chelsea and Manchester United winning two each, and Liverpool claiming one.
