With just a handful of matchdays left in the Premier League season, every minute on the pitch is starting to feel like a final exam for Arne Slot’s Liverpool.
The Reds sit fourth on 58 points, but Aston Villa are breathing right down their necks on the same total, separated only by a slim goal-difference advantage of +13 to +5.
Manchester United (61 points) sit just above them ahead of a big game this weekend, while Brighton in sixth are eight points adrift on 50 – meaning the top-five Champions League race essentially boils down to a head-to-head shootout between Liverpool and Villa for the final automatic qualification spots (although the big gap between fifth and sixth is a safety net of sorts).
Liverpool have officially announced that the Reds’ Premier League trip to Aston Villa has been moved to a new slot. The match was originally scheduled for Sunday 17 May at 3pm BST, but the fixture has now been brought forward to Sunday 17 May at 12.30pm BST, with Sky Sports broadcasting live in the UK.
The earlier kick-off slot is the latest reshuffle in what has been a hectic end-of-season fixture pile-up, with multiple matchweek 37 games being shifted around to accommodate the FA Cup final and the involvement of English clubs in European competition.
Crucially, the date and time isn’t fully locked in yet. Liverpool have warned that the fixture could move once again – this time to Friday 15 May at 8pm BST – should Aston Villa progress to the Europa League final.
Unai Emery’s side took a big step toward Istanbul after thrashing Bologna in the quarter-finals and now face Nottingham Forest in an all-English Europa League semi-final tie, with the final scheduled for 20 May.
With only three days separating a Sunday Villa Park kick-off from a European final, precedent suggests the Premier League would shift the game to give Villa more recovery time – exactly as they did last season for Spurs and Manchester United ahead of the 2025 Europa League final in Bilbao.