Blackburn boss Mark Hughes will not tie himself up in knots trying to second-guess Liverpool counterpart Rafa Benitez's team changes on Sunday.The Rovers boss knows it is a futile gesture trying to predict who the Spaniard will bring in and leave out - especially after a thrilling but tough midweek Champions League tie against Arsenal which the Reds won 4-2 to progress to the semi-finals.

He will instead concentrate on his own side's strengths as they still retain an interest in the race for UEFA Cup football next season.

"It is difficult to gauge whether their performance in midweek was a good thing or a bad thing for us," said Hughes, who revealed his one regret during his playing career was never scoring at the Kop end at Anfield.

"We could have done with extra time to tire them out somewhat but maybe the hope is they celebrated long into the night after it.

"Rafa will no doubt make a number of changes from the personnel he used the other night, that is usually the norm, which makes it a little bit more difficult to prepare for because you are never quite sure which personnel you are going to face.

"You can second-guess to a certain extent - the likelihood is key players who have played two or three games back to back may well not be involved.

"You can make educated guesses but whether they are the right guesses is open to debate.

"But whoever plays for Liverpool you are always guaranteed it is a player of good quality and it will be a difficult game for us - it always is.

"The key from our point of view is that we concentrate on what we are going to do."

The outcome of Rovers' next two matches could prove crucial to their hopes of securing European football.

After the trip to Anfield Blackburn host Manchester United but with the side currently eighth in the Premier League two defeats could end UEFA Cup ambitions - even via the Intertoto Cup.

"We are still fighting to get that European place outright and if we can get results in the next two games we have three matches (Portsmouth, Derby and Birmingham) which we want to get maximum points from," said Hughes.

"Where we stand at the moment, if we don't pick up any more points we won't qualify.

"We need more points on the board and that means we need to win Premier League games - if it happens at the weekend we don't mind.

"We have a couple of games coming up which the players will need no motivation for and we approach them with no apprehension.

"We are looking to realise our ambitions and there is a lot riding on the next couple of games for us.

"We are still in the mix so until it is mathematically impossible to achieve a UEFA Cup place outright we will keep going.

"If we are honest with ourselves the realistic opportunity for us will be in the Intertoto but we will keep going.

"If we get three wins and get to 60 points we would have had a real go at it and will not be a million miles away from the targets we set ourselves at the beginning of the season."

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