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Reds desperate to beat Lyon

Author: Brandon Barker
Date: 20/10/2009
Football betting

Liverpool's recent travails could worsen when they take on Lyon in the stand-out tie of Tuesday's Champions League clashes.

The pressure on Rafa Benitez will intensify to unprecedented levels if his side fail to beat the French outfit on Tuesday and Manchester United at Anfield five days later.

The weekend defeat at Sunderland, courtesy of a bizarre goal by Darren Bent, was the Reds' fourth loss in nine Premier League matches and left them seven points adrift of early leaders Manchester United.

To add to Benitez's woes, he will be without Fernando Torres for the game against the current Ligue 1 leaders, who surprisingly lost 2-0 at home to Sochaux at the weekend, their first loss of the campaign.

Torres sustained a groin injury while on international duty with Spain but Steven Gerrard, who has a similar problem and also missed the Stadium of Light setback, is expected to feature against Lyon.

Elsewhere, in Group E, Fiorentina could add to Liverpool's problems by beating whipping boys Debrecen while Barcelona's stranglehold on Group F should be strengthened as last season's winners host Rubin Kazan.

Pep Guardiola's side have already been installed as the online favourites to retain the trophy they won in May and face the Russian champions, who have taken only one point from their first two clashes, in what is proving to be the toughest of the eight groups.

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Internazionale have drawn their first two matches and the pressure will be on Jose Mourinho's side to beat Dynamo Kyiv at the San Siro as the Ukrainian outfit are currently second in the group.

Inter warmed up for the game with an impressive 5-0 demolition of Genoa on Saturday, a result that lifted them two points clear at the top of the Serie A table, but they need to replicate their domestic form on the European stage if they are to progress to the knockout stages.

Rangers' hopes of reaching the last 16 will effectively be over if they fail to beat the Romanian outsiders Unirea Urziceni at Ibrox while Sevilla face possibly their toughest test in the group as they travel to Germany to play Stuttgart.

Arsenal will expect to return from the Netherlands with all three points as AZ Alkmaar are struggling to cope with the demands of a hectic domestic and European schedule.

Last term's Dutch champions are already 11 points behind leaders FC Twente and have tasted defeat in five of their opening ten Eredivisie games as well as securing only one point from two Champions League matches.

In the other Group H game, Olympiacos can take a giant stride towards qualifying for the knockout stages if they can beat Standard Liege, who came so close to beating the Gunners in the opening round of fixtures.

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