Brendan Rodgers confident about Christian Benteke

After flying home from Malaysia, Liverpool will play Finnish side HJK Helsinki on Aug. 1 before playing their opening game of the 2015-16 Premier League season at Stoke City on Aug. 9.

“I’m a lot more optimistic than I was this time previous year”.

Benteke initially struggled for form during the first half of last season, but improved drastically following the appointment of Tim Sherwood as successor to Paul Lambert in February and helped fire Villa to top-flight safety as well as a domestic cup final.

“I’m not sure, that will entirely be up to Mario“, the coach continued, when asked whether the troubled forward would still be a Liverpool player come September. He’s a big guy but he’s got the attributes that I like in terms of pace and movement and he gets goals, he gets all types of goals.

He is great in the air, strong; he can hold the game up and he can play counterattack or play deep with his physical strength.

“We have made signings and we hope they will come in and make a huge impact”. As part of one of the best Belgian squad of all-time, the 6ft 3ins striker will want to prove himself at the top of the Premier League and also in Europe in order to cement his starting berth for the national team.

“They have been great supporters of myself, they believe in my work and my job is just to work well with the team and finish as high as we can”.

But Kovacic’s agent, Nikky Vuksan, says the midfielder is happy in Milan and it is “certain” he will remain at the San Siro this summer.

“I’m happy with those we’ve brought in”, he added, referring to James Milner, Danny Ings, Joe Gomez, Adam Bogdan, Firmino and Nathaniel Clyne.

“I’d never had staff been with me all the way through my career”. I take nothing for granted. “My job is to work well with the team and see if we can finish as high as we possibly can”.

The Reds manager failed to comment on any further transfers, insisting that his immediate aim was to improve the fitness of the new players, and help them settle into the system, while he also seemed content with the arrivals so far at Anfield.