Rafa playing with fire as he relies on late show

They say some things never change and as we embark on this new season it seems Liverpool's customary Champions League luck has yet to desert them.

Rafael Benitez's side squeezed past a plucky Standard Liege side in qualifying in a manner that hardly surprises us any more.

Dirk Kuyt struck at the end of extra time after two legs in which the Scousers’ goalie Pepe Reina was comfortably his side's better player.

Quite how a side who finished fourth in their domestic league and then scraped into the main draw by the thinnest of margins is then a top seed in for the first group phase is beyond me.

The seeds were selected by the mystical 'UEFA coefficient' and take into account performances in the competition over the last five years.

Yes, Liverpool's record is good but surely there should be some disadvantage to forcing your way in through the back door.

To be fair Benitez's opponents could have been easier than PSV Eindhoven, Marseille and Atletico Madrid, but they could have been a lot worse.

One player who will sit up and take notice of the draw is Liverpool's adopted son Fernando Torres, who faces an emotional return to the club where he learned his trade and was hero-worshiped.

I expect the Reds to qualify, but I doubt they will make it easy as they have so often left it late in previous years.

This habit is starting to rub off in their domestic performances as well - their two wins this season have come courtesy of late goals by (guess who?) Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard.

The problem for Benitez is he knows this luck must run out and if he continues to rely on moments of magic from his stars he will eventually be found wanting.

He has assembled a good squad but the side has no settled way of playing and struggle to dominate matches.

This is perhaps a reflection on Rafa's infamous tinkering with his starting line-up.

He needs to work out his first eleven and get them playing with width so 'wide' players like Kuyt, Babel and Benayoun aren't always cutting inside and cramming up the space where Gerrard and Robbie Keane like to operate.

If he gets this sorted, Benitez may even see his team's domestic results improve as well.

Chelsea may have been accused of being lucky last season as they scrapped their way to a series of 1-0 wins in poor performances last season.

But, as anyone who has been in football will tell you, fortune has a funny way of catching up with you and it may not be a coincidence that the Blues fell agonisingly short on three fronts last term.