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So that's a disadvantage."

READ MORE:Liverpool face PSG showdown as Champions League draw confirms route to finalREAD MORE:Liverpool could be without four players against Man City as Arne Slot forced to rip up plan

Sure enough, after Liverpool ultimately ended up topping the standings and PSG beat both Manchester City and Stuttgart in their final first round games before thrashing Brest in the play-off round 10-0 on aggregate, the two European heavyweights will now meet in the round of 16.

Being asked to overcome one of Europe's most in-form and dangerous clubs doesn't seem like much reward for Liverpool having won seven of their eight opening stage games.

Of course, finishing first wasn't without benefits, with Liverpool avoiding the need to negotiate a play-off round while also ensuring the second leg in the next round is played at Anfield.

But the same could be said of any team finishing in the top eight, including Aston Villa and Arsenal who the Reds could face in the quarter-final and semi-final respectively.

With the three remaining Premier League teams on the same 'silver' half of the draw made at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland on Friday morning, there will be no all-English final.

Indeed, should both Liverpool and Arsenal reach the semi-final, the second leg - at Anfield - would be played immediately before the Premier League clash between the two title rivals at the same venue.

That, though, is looking way too far ahead.

PSG are the only focus and, having been eliminated from the FA Cup, Liverpool have a free weekend before the first leg with the following midweek's Anfield return played a few days after a home Premier League clash against Southampton.

That schedule could have been more onerous.

The game in Paris will be Liverpool's first return to the capital since the unseemly scenes before, during and after the Champions League final loss to Real Madrid in 2022 that subsequently saw UEFA rightly criticised for wrongly attempting to pin the blame for the trouble around the stadium on Reds supporters.

But rather than the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, the tie will be played at PSG's home ground at the Parc des Princes in the Ile-de-France region, where Liverpool beat Real Madrid in the 1981 final but lost to PSG in the group stage in 2018/19.

The Reds had beaten the French side earlier in the group on the way to winning the competition, while their only other competitive meeting came in 1996/97 when Liverpool fell short of overturning a first-leg 3-0 away deficit to lose 3-2 on aggregate and miss out on a place in the final of the now-defunct European Cup Winners' Cup.

"At this stage of the competition, the quality of opponent is only going to be of a very high standard and in PSG we have drawn a team and a club with real European pedigree," said Slot of the latest match-up.

"As is the case with ourselves, PSG are top of their domestic league and are enjoying a long unbeaten run.

This tells us all that we need to know about the challenge that we will face but it is also a challenge that we will look forward to, knowing that we also fully deserve to be in the last 16."

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With Real Madrid also on the same side of the draw as Liverpool, Reds fans are at least spared another final showdown with the European Super League advocates.

Major rivals have to be beaten somewhere along the line for a team to be crowed European champions.

But it appears Slot was not wrong to question the value of finishing top of the revamped Champions League table.
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