Rafael Benitez believes the fierce battle for starting places in his first Premiership team next month is spurring his players on during their pre-season preparations.
With Fernando Torres, Ryan Babel, Yossi Benayoun and Andriy Voronin having arrived at the club this summer, the Liverpool boss will be spoilt for choice all over the field as he looks to shape a team capable of challenging for the Premiership crown.
And he insists that fact is proving to be a major motivating factor for his players as they go through their warm-up work in Switzerland this week.
"I've said many times my idea at Liverpool was to build a squad with at least two good players for each position," said the manager.
"What's important is that the standard of all these players is now very high. That's the key for me. Over the course of eight or nine months of the season we will have injuries and suspensions, but when everyone is fit you will see all the players working very hard to be at their best for every game. That means the quality across the whole squad improves. Maybe you can see already how hard the players are working.
"It's too soon to start talking about what players will do this season, but you can see we have players such as Pennant and Benayoun who have the ability to change a game.
"We know they have the ability to do things on the pitch which others cannot and the key is to see them always trying to make a difference on the pitch. Already a lot of our players are showing their quality.
"But we must be careful when talking about these games. People should remember the players have still trained on the same day as they've played in the matches so they are not at their level yet.
"We have seen a lot of positive play already. It's good for us we are scoring goals and creating a lot of chances, but it's normal the balance between our defence and attack isn't what it should be yet. On Tuesday, it was also a very physical game with a good tempo."
Liverpool's next game is against Auxerre on Friday afternoon (KO 2pm). The game will be broadcast live and exclusive on Setanta Sports. Sign up for Setanta now and as well as watching our clash with Auxerre, you'll also be able to enjoy LFC TV - the club's new dedicated channel - when it launches in the autumn.
I can see where there is a battle for forward positions, but looking at our defence other than LB, is there really much competition? Lets face it Sami is past it now to keep Carra or Agger out of the team for a long period, Arbeloa is not better than Finnan and I really can't see Rafa dropping Pepe even if he has some porr performances.
With Fernando Torres, Ryan Babel, Yossi Benayoun and Andriy Voronin having arrived at the club this summer, the Liverpool boss will be spoilt for choice all over the field as he looks to shape a team capable of challenging for the Premiership crown.
And he insists that fact is proving to be a major motivating factor for his players as they go through their warm-up work in Switzerland this week.
"I've said many times my idea at Liverpool was to build a squad with at least two good players for each position," said the manager.
"What's important is that the standard of all these players is now very high. That's the key for me. Over the course of eight or nine months of the season we will have injuries and suspensions, but when everyone is fit you will see all the players working very hard to be at their best for every game. That means the quality across the whole squad improves. Maybe you can see already how hard the players are working.
"It's too soon to start talking about what players will do this season, but you can see we have players such as Pennant and Benayoun who have the ability to change a game.
"We know they have the ability to do things on the pitch which others cannot and the key is to see them always trying to make a difference on the pitch. Already a lot of our players are showing their quality.
"But we must be careful when talking about these games. People should remember the players have still trained on the same day as they've played in the matches so they are not at their level yet.
"We have seen a lot of positive play already. It's good for us we are scoring goals and creating a lot of chances, but it's normal the balance between our defence and attack isn't what it should be yet. On Tuesday, it was also a very physical game with a good tempo."
Liverpool's next game is against Auxerre on Friday afternoon (KO 2pm). The game will be broadcast live and exclusive on Setanta Sports. Sign up for Setanta now and as well as watching our clash with Auxerre, you'll also be able to enjoy LFC TV - the club's new dedicated channel - when it launches in the autumn.
I can see where there is a battle for forward positions, but looking at our defence other than LB, is there really much competition? Lets face it Sami is past it now to keep Carra or Agger out of the team for a long period, Arbeloa is not better than Finnan and I really can't see Rafa dropping Pepe even if he has some porr performances.
Bring Back Pako
Oh dear
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