Liverpool has been handed a potentially important Premier League advantage after the final Champions League placings were determined — with the Reds not having to worry about the playoff round having topped the standings.

Manchester City, though, will have to play either Real Madrid or Bayern Munich in a mammoth clash next month. The second leg of that tie will take place just a few days before Pep Guardiola's men host Liverpool at the Etihad Stadium.

Not only will Liverpool have an extra rest as a result of finishing inside the top eight places in UEFA's new-look competition, then, but it will also have a perfectly timed break before the Manchester City game. The Etihad side will have no such luxury.

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With Guardiola's men trailing by 12 points in the Premier League, its priority now must be in Europe. To go far in the Champions League, however, it will have to knock out one of the favorites.

With a crucial fixture added in just before it plays Liverpool, that will be a distraction. It is also likely to be a match that takes plenty out of the Manchester City players' legs. Liverpool will meet a team that finished 15th, 16th, 17th or 18th in the standings in the last 16. Those teams are Paris Saint-Germain, Benfica, Monaco and Brest.

Those four clubs will be paired together in the knockout phase play-off draw on Friday. Their two-legged ties will be held on February 11/12 and February 18/19. The last-16 draw is then scheduled to be held on February 21, two days before Manchester City hosts Liverpool in the league, when the paths for the rest of the knockout stage will also be mapped out.

"Going to Bayern Munich or Real Madrid will be really tough but it's in two weeks and in two weeks we have a few players back, the new signings back, so hopefully we can do two good games," Guardiola said live on TNT Sports. "We suffered all season without players. To have these players, you have more alternatives. Hopefully, Jeremy [Doku] is back as well so we have players to do it and do our best."

"It took me a while to understand this new [Champions League] format," Arne Slot said in his press conference before the game with PSV. "I always say when I think I’m 100 per cent sure, I use ‘99.9’ but now I can say I’m 100 percent sure that it doesn’t matter at all if we end up one or two [in the table].

"We will play 14, 15, 16, 17 and then in the end it’s a draw [for] which of the teams we are going to face. So, this is a game for us — because we are now No.1 or No.2, we cannot drop to No.3 — that has no importance of result coming to the league table.

"But a very wise man once said to me, ‘I have never seen anything good coming from losing a football game’ so we are not going into the game tomorrow trying to lose the game, we will do everything we can to try to win it, of course."