Liverpool already turned down a chance to get a much bigger gap, so they can't really afford to lose to Villa at this point, even a tie wouldn't be really ideal for them. They had a great season so far and I am pretty sure that we are going to end up with a much better situation here and could do a lot better on the long run as well. This is why I can see how Liverpool will put everything they have into this game and get a win.

Luckily, Liverpool finished in top 8 for UCL so they could put this game here, if Liverpool was somewhere between 9-24 they would have UCL game instead, with this game they are going to be getting ahead again so they are going to need that extra game and extra points in this case as well, would benefit them.