Former Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand has reluctantly labelled old rivals Liverpool one of the favourites to win this season’s Champions League, despite their laboured performance in drawing 1-1 against Midtjylland this week.
A somewhat second-string Liverpool side shared the points with the Danish team on Tuesday night, with the Reds’ fastest ever Champions League goal coming courtesy of Mohamed Salah within 55 seconds before Alexander Scholz equalised for the hosts shortly after the hour mark.
Thereafter, Liverpool were up against it, but Jurgen Klopp’s players managed to escape with a point. They entered the Group D game with top spot and a place in the last 16 already confirmed, so Ferdinand refrained from reading too much into their slightly lacklustre performance.
“I put Bayern Munich favourites, but I would have Liverpool close second favourites,” Ferdinand told BT Sport.
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“It is great to see big teams are in there, the English boys are in there – bar Manchester United disappointingly.”
“But I think the English teams will go deep in the tournament, I think they have got some real quality. Bayern and possibly PSG are the only threats.”
Bayern defeated Paris Saint-Germain 1-0 in last season’s final, with the best effort by an English team coming from Manchester City, who were eliminated by Lyon in the quarter-finals.
“If they [Bayern] don’t have injuries, I think they will go on and do it again,” Ferdinand added, “with the experience they have in that team and the explosiveness they have got in the wide areas.”
“[Chelsea] could be [a dark horse]. They are a team that are starting to gel together, you can see Frank [Lampard] has done good business up to now in the transfer market.
“Get through the Christmas period and New Year and see how the squad is shaping up injury-wise and form-wise.
“When the Champions League restarts again, we will have to readdress our expectations for certain teams because form and injuries play a big part.”
Ferdinand’s former club Man United were eliminated on Tuesday as they were beaten 3-2 by RB Leipzig.
United only needed a point in Germany to ensure their qualification from Group H, but they found themselves trailing 3-0 before a Bruno Fernandes penalty and Ibrahima Konate own goal in the final 10 minutes gave the visitors hope of a draw.
The equaliser evaded the Premier League outfit, however, and they exited the competition as PSG and Leipzig progressed.
