I’ve got my prediction hat out again and I’m predicting that Liverpool will draw
their Merseyside neighbours Everton in the 3rd round of the Champions League qualifying matches. Of course this will all be by the “luck of the draw” and the fact that UEFA and all of it’s members (bar the English FA of course) were pretty pissed off to see one country having an unprecedented 5 clubs into the world’s biggest club competition, has no bearing whatsoever – shame on you for even suggesting that!
Liverpool drawing Everton would mean only 4 English teams could make it to the main draw (duh!). UEFA and member countries go home happy, check.
Liverpool will obviously beat Everton over two legs, so it’ll be poetic justice for Liverpool as the English FA should really have nominated us as the fourth team as defending champions ala Spanish Federation in the year Real Madrid won the Champions League but finished fifth (just like us). No one complained then that the rules were being changed midway or something like that, because they weren’t. Rules clearly state that if a team that wins the Champions League fails to finish high enough in the league to qualify for next year’s championships, the country’s FA can choose to send in that team in place of the lowest placed qualifier. You would have thought the English FA would be sensible enough to realize that the European Champions would be better representatives of the country than a team that gets beaten 7-zip domestically, but obviously not.
A Liverpool win would also means more money for other teams that go through and for Liverpool themselves. So make that all English qualifiers (including Liverpool) happy, check.
FA would claim to have done their part – “lobbying” to ensure Liverpool get into the champions league, albeit at the first stage of the qualifiers which was a bit of a disgrace but we seem to have gotten past that without any troubles of any kind (injuries or performance, touch-wood!), so that might serve us well in the course of the season. Sure we must have lost a bit of cash from the tour of the far-east planned, but the two/ three extra home games should have gone some way in compensating that. Anyways, FA is happy, check.
The only real loser would be Everton – once again Liverpool fans are happy, check.
Moyes has already expressed his fear that the above might come true saying that Everton are the only team that loses form Liverpool not getting the country protection. As a rule clubs from the same country cannot draw each other in the qualifiers or be drawn into the same group. But Liverpool being the fifth club from their country (unprecedented, as stated above) were deemed to be “country-less”. Hence they could draw Everton, but not the Mancs because both ManU and Liverpool are seeded for the qualifiers and Everton are not. Seeded teams can’t play each other, of course. In fact Liverpool might have been deemed as “country-less” but UEFA did grant them the status of top-seeds (in the qualies as well as group stages) as defending champions.
I suspect Mr. David Moyes’s worst fear will come true in a few hours’ time.