English FA Premiership: Goalkeeper Jose Reina tells Louise Taylor that a loss tomorrow will more or less put paid to Liverpool's title hopes.

The word surrender is not supposed to feature in Liverpool's lexicon, but their goalkeeper yesterday conceded that defeat at Manchester United tomorrow would effectively end Rafael Benitez's hopes of claiming this season's Premiership title. Jose Reina admitted that the trip to Old Trafford could make or break a league campaign already blemished by three away defeats.

"We know we are losing ground and that we are too far behind," he explained. "Eight points behind Manchester United is too many points. We have to keep going and fighting for everything but, if they win on Sunday, it will be 11 points between us and that could prove too much to make up.

"We have to try and win what is a very important game, although we know it won't be easy."

Moreover, the Merseysiders have still to win on their Premiership travels this season.

"We know we are not playing at our top level away from home," admitted Benitez, who does not share Reina's title pessimism. "But I'm sure that will improve."

Tellingly, the manager appeared to have anticipated Liverpool's sluggish opening to the Premiership campaign. Indeed, he has referred to the disruptive impact the recent spate of internationals has had on his domestic preparations so many times that some feel it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

"When you start a season like this with international breaks and all the problems that go with them it was clear that some of my players would not be properly fit," he claimed last week. "Players like Carragher, Alonso, Hyypia, Reina and Finnan are all internationals so it is impossible for them to be fit now after all the international matches. But, little by little, they will get better now; they will improve."

The idea is that international football's coming winter hibernation will permit Benitez to envelop Liverpool's players in the hermetically-sealed world he so carefully creates for them. It is a parallel universe where this one-time teacher of physical education leaves nothing to chance. Quite apart from the overnight hotel stays routinely undertaken by teams before away games, Liverpool have built bedrooms at their Melwood training base, thereby enabling Benitez to also supervise his squad's sleeping patterns on nights preceding and, sometimes, following home fixtures.

Benitez's constantly rotated personnel have become accustomed to undergoing frequent blood tests designed to pinpoint their stamina levels. Other clubs also analyse players' blood but few do it quite so often and the fear is that Liverpool's manager may be at risk of breeding an "excuses culture" by routinely informing individuals he is resting them because they are "tired".

Benitez, though, has precedent on his side having won two Spanish titles with Valencia in 2002 and 2004 courtesy of weekly player rotation and late, but victorious, sprints to the La Liga finishing line. "I have confidence that we will be there at the end of the season because we must still play the big teams at home," he insisted yesterday.

Nevertheless, even Liverpool's manager must suspect that defeat tomorrow will kill any title talk at Anfield for yet another year.

• Guardian Service