Hooray!........Oh S--t

Liverpool's do-or-die match at Marseille in the Champions League couldn't have gone better. Gerrard collected the remains of his briefly saved fourth-minute penalty, Fernando Torres continued to be worth every pound, and Kuyt and Babel piled on in the second half to send the French side to the UEFA Cup and themselves forward to the final 16 of the Champions League.

Upon further review, the news is not all great. FC Porto predictably eliminated Turkish side Besiktas with a win, and also took first in the group. The draw for the next round is not free-for-all, and although they match each first place team with a second place team, they will not match two teams that just tangled in the group stage, so of the eight teams the Reds could see in February, Porto is out. Despite that four groups are not finished until tomorrow, three of those groups have first place teams whose place cannot be usurped. The other stipulation about the first knockout round is that clubs from the same nation cannot face one another until the quarterfinals, so Chelsea and Manchester United are out as well. With Arsenal second in their group going into tomorrow, there are five teams left that Liverpool could face in the next stage, but if Arsenal can win their group tomorrow, FC Sevilla comes off the board. The other four possible opponents are a true punishment for not triumphing in the group they were seeded first in:

--> Barcelona
--> Real Madrid
--> Inter Milan
--> AC Milan (nightmare fuel)

Yikes. I guess you can't expect to play the Stuttgart's and Dynamo Kiev's of the world all the way to the final, but that's going to be a hell of a potential road just to get to the quarterfinals.

But I guess I should be thankful they made it through and worry about the next hurdle when they get to it....