You sense it’s going to be a very long week, being an Evertonian.  The debate over the permutations surrounding qualification into next season’s Champions' League will become drastically reduced this Tuesday evening should newly crowned Premiership champions Chelsea prevail when entering the pit across Stanley Park.  It goes without saying that we wish Chelsea all the best and welcome them to Merseyside with open arms.  Keep that blue flag flying high!  And bring yer scoring boots for crissakes…

On Saturday last, a gloriously sunny afternoon upon the banks of a not so royal blue Thames, we witnessed yet another chance to seal that fourth place spot slip by.  How many more opportunities can we afford to allow slide away?  Be thankful, I suppose, for the inability of others to make the most of our own failings over recent months....

Anyway, it remains the box seat we’re in; with both a three-point advantage and a game in hand over Liverpool, we should prevail.  However, this is Everton we’re talking about and if any club knows how to keep the fan base dangling, living on their nerves, it is Everton!  Should Liverpool miss out on Champions' League glory this season, they will surely rue their appalling form (bless!) over recent weeks which has seen them return a poor five points from a possible 15 on offer. 

Liverpool desperately need an Everton collapse over our remaining three fixtures.  Bolton remain on the outside looking in, their own aspirations of grandeur amongst the elite in next season’s Champions' League a mathematical certainty to end in tears should Everton win one of their remaining three games.  We are now down to the wire; for the first time in many years we’re involved right at the death of the season, the added somewhat delicious twist being the local rivalry for a European place: a simple equation – Everton or Liverpool for that coveted fourth place and entry into next season’s Champions' League.  I wonder if Rick Parry  is sweating yet!

Newcastle United visit us next Saturday at Goodison Park – a fixture teed up nicely and easy to promote as now being billed: the biggest in recent history – because that is precisely what this game has become.  It’s not a Mersey derby with local pride at stake; it’s not a cup final with silverware up for grabs; it’s not a last-day dice with relegation and our Premiership existence in the balance.  It has become more than that – the outcome of this one game could so easily shape our immediate future.  Win it and we are almost across the finish line, in with a cracking chance of lining those empty Goodison coffers with some of that lucrative Champions League money – and sadly that is precisely what the game is about these days: money.  Lose it; well we earn a date in the Last Chance Saloon, away in Bolton a week later.  Right now, I’d rather not consider that an option!

It may prove a blessing in disguise facing Newcastle United 24 hours before Liverpool travel to Highbury to face an Arsenal side attempting themselves to guarantee automatic qualification into next year’s Champions' League.  What a chance we have, in front of a passionate home crowd at Goodison, to finally grab that fourth place and make it ours for keeps.  Beating Newcastle at home would put us six points clear of Liverpool and more importantly beyond Bolton's reach.  We could then salivate over the prospect of hopefully watching (“live and exclusive on Sky Sports!”) Liverpool failing to beat Arsenal at Highbury, thereby ensuring our fourth place finish. 

With the finish line in sight, it is vital we repeat the atmosphere of a fortnight back when Manchester United paid us a visit.  Add into the mix the fact that it is our last home fixture of the season, this is our last chance to commend our team on home turf for the wonderful collective efforts this season – a season littered with memorable highs taking us to the edge of something no Blue could surely have predicted last August.

Giant steps, indeed…