Loris Karius knows only too well how one game can change a career

F our days after the 2018 Champions League final, Jürgen Klopp got a call from Franz Beckenbauer. Like everyone, the legendary former Germany captain and coach had seen the game in Kyiv, seen Liverpool losing 3-1 to Real Madrid after a pair of blunders by their goalkeeper Loris Karius. And something about it hadn’t quite looked right. After a conversation with a doctor, he picked up the phone to Klopp. “Your goalkeeper had a concussion,” Beckenbauer told Klopp.

An armchair diagnosis, for sure, but one that intrigued Klopp enough to make further inquiries. The next day Karius was flown to Boston where he had rigorous tests at the Spaulding Rehabilitation hospital. The concussion assessment consists of a checklist of 30 symptoms, including headache, light sensitivity, loss of memory and nausea. Five days after the biggest game of his life, Karius still had 26 of the 30 clinical signs of concussion.

The fateful events of Kyiv – in which Karius rolled the ball into Karim Benzema’s foot, before spilling Gareth Bale’s shot into his own net – would shape and scar the goalkeeper for years. He received death threats. He was heckled by opposition players. After leaving Liverpool he went on a carousel of unsatisfactory moves, first to Besiktas then to Union Berlin and finally to unemployment. And the game that set this entire doleful spiral in motion was played under the cloud of a severe head trauma.

The Carabao Cup final on Sunday offers Karius the opportunity of a remarkable comeback. It is Newcastle’s first cup final in 24 years, and with Nick Pope suspended and Martin Dubravka cup-tied, their hopes rest on their third-choice goalkeeper, hastily signed on a free in the summer and almost released in January. It may well be the