Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho believes Liverpool have a big advantage in the Premier League title race due to their lack of European involvement.
Mourinho’s men head the table but fourth-placed Liverpool are just four points adrift.
Chelsea, second-placed Arsenal and third-placed Manchester City are all involved in Europe’s premier club competition.
Although Brendan Rodgers’ men are 8-1 with most bookmakers, the Portuguese thinks they have to be taken seriously because they do not have the distraction of European football.
Mourinho explained: “When I say we’re not the top candidate everyone thinks ‘Here he is again, with what you like to call the mind games’. “But it’s just my feeling. The league is amazing but Liverpool have a big advantage because of the fact they don’t play in the Champions League.”
Mourinho does not expect his team or any of their rivals to have an easy run-in. He said: “Every team needs points for their objective – some for relegation, some for Champions League football and some are trying to be champions. It’s going to be hard for everybody.”
Wojciech Szczesny, meanwhile, has contended that Arsenal’s Premier League title push remains on course, despite the disappointing results against Liverpool and Manchester United, as Arsene Wenger considers changes to his starting XI for Sunday’s FA Cup visit of Liverpool.
Arsenal could only draw 0-0 at home to United on Wednesday night in the wake of Saturday’s 5-1 defeat at Liverpool.
But Szczesny said Arsenal could take heart from the more resilient display, in which he made two vital saves to deny Robin van Persie.
He also advanced the draw as evidence the Anfield debacle is "out of our system".
Postponed
With Chelsea gaining only a point at West Bromwich Albion on Tuesday and Manchester City's home fixture against Sunderland on Wednesday being postponed, Arsenal sit only one point off the top of the table.
“We are in a good position in the league, and we are still in the FA Cup and the Champions League, so I don’t know what kind of frustration we should have,” Szczesny said.
“The frustration should have been a year or two ago when we were struggling. We’re still there at the top of the table. We are going to push for the title. We are still confident.
He added: “I was happy with a clean sheet against United because we had to recover from conceding five goals on Saturday – and I thought we were solid defensively, as we always are at home.
“We didn’t get the three points and that’s disappointing, but I think we got back on track with the clean sheet and, hopefully, we can push on from here.
“If we could have a similar last 10 games to last season, we’d be in a good position. With the football we play . . . other teams might get tired, but we seem to push on. Hopefully we’ll do the same thing again and that will give us a good chance.”
The Liverpool result was made all the more shocking because Arsenal had conceded only four goals in their previous 10 matches in all competitions. They were 4-0 down after 20 minutes at Anfield.
“You can see from the good performance against United that it is out of our system,” Szczesny said. “It was just an accident. They were terrific offensively, we were a little bit weak defensively, and we got punished. I don’t think you can say you saw the real Arsenal at Anfield.
“We’ve seen the real Arsenal over the last year. Our defensive record has been amazing.
“It was a little bit humiliating to concede five on Saturday and we want to recover as soon as possible. It’s a good chance to do that a week after.”
Szczesny believes fourth-placed Liverpool, whose last-minute win at Fulham on Wednesday lifted them to within four points of the leaders, Chelsea, ought to be considered as title contenders, especially as Brendan Rodgers' side have not had the demands of European football this season.
"I don't know whether that's an advantage," Szczesny said. "I wouldn't give up European football. It's very enjoyable. You can also look at it as gaining experience when you do play in the Champions League."
