As they took their seats in the Olympic Stadium in Athens in May, just three months after their takeover of Liverpool, Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr must have been licking their lips. This Champions League business, they might well have mused, is easy money.

Fast forward six months and two European Cup finals in three seasons must feel like a distant memory for everyone associated with English football’s most successful club, not least their American owners.

When Hicks and Gillett Jr bankrolled Rafael Benítez’s £40 million spending spree in the summer, they did so in the belief that it would allow the manager to compete for the Barclays Premier League title. Unbeaten in that competition, if hardly firing on all cylinders, the dream is still alive but scarcely could they have imagined that, by making the league a priority, the wheels would come off in Europe, for so long Utopia for Benítez.

Come off they have, though, to such an extent that even if Liverpool beat Besiktas at Anfield tomorrow and then win their remaining two matches in group A, they could still be dependent on other results going their way if they are not to fall at the first hurdle for the first time during Benítez’s three-year reign. A draw or defeat against the team that beat them 1-0 in Istanbul a fortnight ago, coupled with victory for FC Porto over Marseilles in Portugal, would mean the unthinkable to the supporters and players who have grown so accustomed to flourishing in Europe under Benítez.

To Hicks and Gillett Jr, early elimination from the Champions League would represent a nasty blot on the budget sheet. Liverpool earned £32.22 million through television revenue and participation, match and performance bonuses for reaching the Champions League final last season.

The prospect of receiving a fraction of that figure for failing to get beyond the group stage might not seem so bad given the new £2.73 billion global television contract that is being shared by the 20 Premier League clubs, but when there is a new stadium costing more than £400 million to fund every penny counts.

“We know we must win. It is important to us as a club. It is important to the financial situation,” Benítez said last week, before trying to insist that money is not everything to owners heavily indebted to the banks. This promises to be one of the more testing weeks of Benítez’s tenure as Liverpool manager, but even with confidence ebbing and no Fernando Torres, Xabi Alonso or Daniel Agger to call upon, Liverpool should still prove too strong for Besiktas at Anfield. “It is time to believe,” Benítez said.

Chelsea can qualify for the knockout stages if they beat Schalke 04 in Germany tomorrow and Rosenborg overcome Valencia. Celtic need to defeat Benfica in Glasgow if they are realistic about progressing from group D.

Having held Barcelona to a goalless draw in Glasgow, Rangers may well dare to believe that they can cause another upset when they face the 2006 champions at the Nou Camp on Wednesday evening. Victory, coupled with a Stuttgart win away to Lyons, would be enough to ensure the Scottish club’s progression to the knockout stages from arguably the toughest group with two games to spare.

Arsenal need only a draw on Wednesday away to Slavia Prague, who were hammered 7-0 at the Emirates Stadium a fortnight ago, to qualify from group H, while a point for Manchester United along with a victory for AS Roma over Sporting Lisbon on the same night would be enough to book their place in the knockout stages.