The Odds of Landing 4th!

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I have been accused to endorsing Europa League football, but mine was a case of trying to walk before I could run and perhaps of being a tad cautious with my pretentions and expectations. The math says that both Europa as well as Champions League football could be at the end of the tunnel, and there is light, a flicker perhaps, but it is still a light of hope.

Although I personally still feel Europa League football is a good alternative to no European football (if anything to give our rising stars experience) I will try to make some people happy by raising my sights and aim higher…..the target being Champions League football. At the present time there is an obstacle between us and CL football called Manchester City, with a hurdle in between called Tottenham Hotspurs. In this instance, and perhaps for the mere joy or savouring the possibility, we will assume that the Spurs hurdle will not prove to be an insurmountable and that somewhere along the way; the desperation of others will prove to be the catapult we need to land this goal.

Whatever computation is made, the Reds need to keep marching on and win the remaining four games. With two home games and one away, the Reds biggest battle will be the tie with Spurs which holds a conflict of interest. The other three games are against teams sitting in mid table and which have all acquired PL permanence from next season.

Man City on the contrary have another six games to go (seven if your included the FA Cup Final against Stoke City which will have a domino effect on the game before away to Everton and the one after again to Stoke). Their games have a much different predicament to ours! Blackburn (this evening) and West Ham are running the gauntlet and could be sucked down into Championship football, Everton will want to win higher than us, while both Stoke and Bolton will want to finish on a high. Yes, Man City can also go on a winning streak and notch up all 15 points, as the game against Spurs will be nothing short of a lottery.

All considered, it’s really a battle between three Clubs to land the lucrative and prestigious Champions League spot, or the less desired but still commercially important Europa League alternative. Whoever finishes 6th, position in which the Reds find themselves at present, only play domestic football next season.

My moderate optimism here will make many happy, and as I have been saying for the past weeks; until the math says it can be done, there is no reason why we cannot dream on!

Believe! Dreaming is free and dreams can come true!

15 Comments

  1. The maths works out like this. We need to win our 4 games, there is virtually no leigh way on that, we then need ASpurs to lose two games, one against us comes with winning our games with the other likely to be Chelsea away.

    We then need City to drop 11 points out of 18. The most likel way for that to happen is them to lose their away games (With their away record and no Tevez, its not impossible) and draw with Spurs at home.

    All in all, its very unlikely, but if a few results fall into place over the next couple of weeks, we can start to dream.

  2. I think if we keep winning Tonio then 5th is more likely. I think Man City will want and need to beat or draw with Spurs so 4th could be out of our reach. If Spurs lose to us (we are at home) and lose to Man City the 5th Spotlight can be ours. I’m a bit worried about the Newcastle game as they havent been playing badly at times.
    After last weekend Spurs are struggling
    YNWA

  3. dude the only way we can qualify for champions league is if chelsea and liverpool both defeat tottenham and if tottenham and everton both defeat city and plus we need to win all remaining games that is the only realistic thing i can see.I personally think that the loss to west bromich albion has put a major dent in our chances i mean come on if we would have won that match we would be sitting 5th but as u said till its not possible mathematically we will still not stop dreaming :]

  5. i hope we can go to CL (cross my finger), even it’s really hard to pass thru mancity. we can only do our best each game especially the one against spurs ~YNWA~

  6. A club like Liverpool should only be in the Champions League. The Europa League is detrimental to the club progressing towards winning the premier league title next season.

  7. Being a bit of a science geek (well in my day job anyway) I put together a spreadsheet to work it out and after these results (below) it ends up like this (hopefully the formatting when I press submit won’t mess up):

    Liverpool 64 points, City 63, Spurs 61 –

    Liverpool results- Points
    Newcastle H 3
    Fulham A 3
    Spurs H 3
    Villa A 3

    Spurs results- Points
    Chelsea A 0
    Blackpool H 3
    Man City A 0
    Liverpool A 0
    Brum H 3

    City results- Points
    Blackburn A 0
    West Ham H 3
    Bitters A 0
    Spurs H 3
    Stoke H 1
    Bolton A 0

    Obviously we could also get away with Spurs drawing against Chelsea or even narrowly beating Chelsea or City as we should still have a better goal difference than them. For City I have based my predictions on their poor away form and the FA cup playing on their minds!

    We can but dream…..

  9. We need 2 win all our remaining games& mancity need 2 take less than 9 points in their 6 games.then it wud all boil down 2 goal diff.btw spurs r not a threat anymore 4 d 5th place.

  12. Tonjo: Does Tonjo think that LFC can win the Premier League next season with the addition of 3 major players and a serious influx of the youth players to provide running power? because I do.

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