Liverpool will approach next season with hope in their heads as well as their hearts. By winning three cups and, here on Saturday, reaching the qualifying round for the Champions League, Gerard Houllier's team have put Manchester United on notice that a fourth successive Premiership title is not Old Trafford's for the taking.
Certainly the end of the English season belongs to Anfield. As Houllier's side survived an angst-ridden first half against Charlton Athletic before winning serenely 4-0 to finish third in the Premiership, it was easy to forget the championship had been retained by United five weeks earlier.
Since Alex Ferguson's retirement a year from now promises to be as rancorous as Margaret Thatcher's departure from Downing Street, even Old Trafford may begin to wonder who has had the happier season. For United success has been coming up with the rations, for Liverpool it is a fresh, if hardly new, experience.
With the League Cup won on penalties, the FA Cup snatched from Arsenal by Michael Owen and a crazy UEFA Cup final decided by an own goal, Liverpool could never presume that the win they were almost certainly going to need on Saturday would fall into their laps; or if it did, that their knees would stop knocking long enough to hold on to the points.
After all, a year earlier, needing to win at Valley Parade to deny Leeds United third place, they had lost 1-0 to keep Bradford City up. "If I hadn't qualified for the Champions League this time I would have been very disappointed," Houllier admitted in the wake of Saturday's victory.
"I thought we deserved it because we are stronger than we were last season. If you look at our games this season we have won a lot of them in the last 20 to 25 minutes. I hope that's the hallmark of future champions. If we have to dig in, then we dig in. If we have to play, then we play."
Whether Liverpool's French manager was quite as sanguine after Saturday's first half has to be doubted. For 45 minutes his players appeared physically and mentally drained by their efforts in Cardiff and Dortmund.
In midfield McAllister, Steven Gerrard and Patrik Berger struggled to get into the game against the impressive passing and movement of Mark Kinsella, Claus Jensen and Graham Stuart.
As a result Michael Owen and Robbie Fowler, the latter keeping Emile Heskey on the bench for a change, made little attacking impact.
"We had a little talk at halftime," Houllier admitted, "but I won't tell you what I said." Maybe he sang the Marseillaise. Certainly Liverpool re-emerged ready to mount the barricades.
The service to the front men was much slicker, forcing Charlton back. Ten minutes into the second half, after a corner from McAllister had been halfcleared by Sasa Ilic, Fowler, with his back to goal, executed the perfect overhead shot to find the top corner of the net.
The rest was ruthlessly simple. Danny Murphy came off the Liverpool bench to tuck their second inside the near post from the edge of the penalty area, Owen set up Fowler for a rifle-shot past Ilic, and then completed the scoring himself.
The Charlton manager, Alan Curbishley, was upset by the way his side had collapsed but dismissed talk about his filling the vacancy at West Ham as "just gossip".
CHARLTON: Ilic, Fish, Todd (Konchesky 73), Brown, Powell, Newton (Parker 65), Kinsella, Jensen, Stuart, Svensson (Johansson 59), Bartlett. Subs Not Used: Kishishev, Caig. Booked: Ilic.
LIVERPOOL: Westerveld, Vignal, Babbel, Hyypia, Carragher, Barmby (Murphy 54), McAllister, Gerrard, Berger (Heskey 89), Owen, Fowler. Subs Not Used: Arphexad, Wright, Biscan. Booked: Gerrard. Goals: Fowler 55, Murphy 61, Fowler 71, Owen 80.
Referee: G Barber (Tring).
