Liverpool and Aston Villa meet at Villa Park with a single win each enough for Champions League

Liverpool and Aston Villa walk into Villa Park tonight level on 59 points and split only by goal difference, and either club can leave with Champions League football for next season locked down. A win takes the points tally to 62 with one game remaining, mathematically out of reach for Bournemouth in sixth on 55. A draw, in theory, keeps both honest. A defeat hands the other side the keys and shifts the pressure onto next weekend.

The wider picture is that England gets five Champions League slots for 2026-27 thanks to the UEFA coefficient bonus, and Bournemouth's run-in is short enough that fourth and fifth in the table is what the next 90 minutes is really about. Top three is settled: Arsenal lead on 79, Manchester City are on 77 and Manchester United sit on 65. The race below them comes to Birmingham at 8pm BST.

Slot picks through a thin squad

Arne Slot's team news is a list of doubts. Mohamed Salah is back in the squad after missing two games with a minor hamstring problem from the Crystal Palace win, but the manager said in his Thursday press conference that the forward "will be available tomorrow for only a few minutes" off the bench. Florian Wirtz had a stomach infection ahead of last weekend's Chelsea draw and remains a late call. Alisson has returned to first-team training after almost two months out with hamstring trouble, and his start will also be a game-time decision. Ibrahima Konaté trained fully after a knock against Chelsea.

The longer-term absentees rule out a deeper rotation: Hugo Ekitike and Conor Bradley are both out for months, with Giovanni Leoni, Wataru Endo, Stefan Bajcetic and Jayden Danns also unavailable. Slot, asked about the visit to Villa Park, said it would always be a difficult game, pointing to the depth of Unai Emery's squad as one reason Villa have stayed level with Liverpool this deep into May.

Villa juggle Champions League and Europa final

For Emery, the calculation is more delicate. Aston Villa face Freiburg in the Europa League final at Beşiktaş Park in Istanbul next Wednesday, and rotation is unavoidable. Boubacar Kamara, Amadou Onana and Alysson are all sidelined, and Emery confirmed at his pre-match press conference that the personnel out of the squad has not changed since the weekend. The temptation to manage minutes for the Istanbul final is real, but a top-five finish is the second prize Villa have spent the whole season chasing, and a final-day visit to Manchester City is the kind of fixture nobody wants riding on it.

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