The Blues were trailing 3-0 with 20 minutes left on the clock in Merseyside and our hopes of reclaiming the Youth Cup crown were fading fast. However, a few inspired substitutions and a whole lot of self-belief helped inspire one of our most memorable turnarounds in the competition's history.

Charlie Webster and Jude Soonsup-Bell got us to within a goal of the Reds before Malik Mothersille notched a bizarre leveller with three minutes of normal time to play. That appeared enough to send us into extra-time but Brand's boys were more interested in finishing the job before then and Tudor Mendel-Idowu, another substitute, wrote his name into Youth Cup folklore with an instinctive finish to snatch the win in the fifth minute of added time.

After the final whistle and some deserved celebrations, Brand spoke to us to reflect on a roller-coaster night of emotions as his side marched on into the quarter-finals.

‘It was an unbelievable feeling,' he claimed. 'I've never experienced a feeling like that in football.

'It’s all about getting through to the next round and at 3-0 down after 70 minutes, we never lost faith. From there, our ability and quality shone through.'

While the realist in Brand was disappointed with elements of the performance that saw his team fall three goals behind, the over-riding feeling was one of pride in the effort of his players to keep on fighting and ultimately claim an improbable victory. The goal from Webster to pull it back to 3-1 was decisive and, with 20 minutes remaining, left enough time for the comeback to be completed.

‘We didn't show consistently enough what we are capable of but I'm ecstatic for the boys in the end,' he added.

‘Charlie’s goal was pivotal to setting us off and we could sense the momentum shifting in our favour then. We knew we were capable of getting the win with hard work and quality. Liverpool are an excellent academy and team so we did incredibly well to win it in the 90 minutes.

‘This is a squad effort and now we look forward to the last eight at Stamford Bridge.'

That tie will be played against either Newcastle United or Blackpool before 26 February.