By Various TTT Subscribers.

It’s Symposium time again – and after Tuesday night’s game against Spurs and with two Cup competitions now taking over from Premier League action, we’re asking our Symposium panel where they think we should be directing our attention from here on in – on the Premier League, the Europa League, the FA Cup, or simply on developing the team for next season and beyond? Here’s what they had to say:

Chris Rowland:

I’ve been advocating for some time that if – IF – getting into next season’s Champions League is the ultimate aim of this and every season, ahead of winning cups – and that’s another debate – then it may just be that the best way is to target the Europa League. By winning we get the best of both worlds, a return to the Champions League and a trophy too. Apparently pre-Spurs the bookies rated our chances of doing that at roughly half of our chances of qualifying via League position. As for the FA Cup, well I’m of the opinion that winning a trophy is becoming increasingly important for Rodgers’ tenure at Anfield, and that pressure will only increase until the boil is lanced.

So my stance is that there is no longer any priority, only equal priorities – every game matters  as much as every other, from here on in, the League cannot be called more or less important than the cup games, though that could change if league results mean our prospects for top four look increasingly remote. If that happened, then League games become LESS important than the cups. At this point I don’t attach any  less significance to cup games than League games, and they are no place for resting players for supposedly more important games as, according to my simple logic, there are no more important games than the cup games, so for what would you be resting them? What I do think is possible is that we may have a more exciting end to a season than has seemed likely or possible for most of its first half.

Dan Kennett:

Rodgers may need a trophy for his CV but Liverpool as a club need the Champions League and we need it now. We also need it more than Arsenal and Man United do due to the existing income gaps. Quite simply, if Arsenal and United qualify for the Champions League next season and we don’t it will be disastrous. We’re just about clinging onto the coat-tails of the richest four clubs as it is.  If we miss out and the “richest four” are all in it next year the gap significantly widens again and our only option is to repeat 2013/14. Writing this before Spurs, the bookies still have us twice as likely to qualify for the Champions League through the Premier League (15-20% chance) than through the Europa (7-9% chance). So my list of priorities is:

1.       Premier League

2.       Europa League

3.       {Daylight}

4.       {More Daylight}

5.       {Yet More Daylight}

6.       FA Cup