This item appeared in today's Mirror, written by Andy Dunn, quite depressing really  .

YES, it was 60 years ago. Yes, football was a little different back then. But one of my all-time favourite statistics comes from the 1965-66 season, which ended with Bill Shankly’s Liverpool ­winning the First Division.

The Reds also reached the final of the European Cup Winners’ Cup, where they were beaten 2-1 in extra-time by Borussia Dortmund, at Hampden Park on May 6.

They might have been a bit tired.

In that entire season, Liverpool played 53 matches and Shankly used only 14 players.

Sure, different times, and all that but it is still worth noting an era when managers did not feel ­compelled – or able – to make ­wholesale changes for certain games.

For the Carabao Cup tie against ­Tottenham Hotspur on Wednesday, Nathan Jones made 10 changes to the Charlton Athletic side that won at West Ham United last ­Saturday.

His team was thrashed 5-1. Spurs had been ­hammered in their ­opening game of the ­Premier League season.

Jones cited the ­demands of the ­Championship as one of the reasons why he made so many changes. The Championship season is two games old, for goodness’ sake.

But Jones, whose managerial career has been mixed, also admitted he did not approach the fixture with a great deal of hope.

“We are not going to win this ­competition,” he said after the defeat at Spurs. “Were we going to win ­tonight? Was an upset on the cards? It’s very hard to beat Premier League sides now.”

It certainly is. Especially when you send out your reserves.

Jones is far from an outlier when it comes to English Football League managers fielding second- string players in this ­competition.

On the same night Charlton were thumped by Spurs, Everton cruised past a Preston team whose manager Paul Heckingbottom had made seven changes to his previous line-up.

It has become the norm. But this is the EFL’s property. This should be a flagship competition.

Instead, it is littered with EFL ­managers running up the white flag.

No, Charlton were almost certainly not going to win the competition but they had a chance of beating Spurs. Instead, they merely contributed to the general mediocrity of this latest round of Carabao Cup fixtures.

Championship and lower division managers KNOW that opposing ­Premier League managers will make significant changes.

So why not try and capitalise? Keith Andrews made eight changes for the trip to Birmingham City but Chris Davies made six of his own and saw his team battered 6-1 by Brentford.

Davies felt compelled to apologise to supporters. Rightly so.

Charlton’s Jones is right when he says it is very hard to beat Premier League sides. And the fact the last 13 editions of the EFL Cup have been shared between five clubs – ­Man City, Chelsea, Newcastle United, Liverpool and Man United – tells you something.

It tells you the big question ­related to the Carabao Cup is not about who is going to win it. It is what is the point?