Gerrard can’t wait for Rafa’s new signings
Wednesday night’s 2-0 triumph at Sunderland took them to their highest position in the Premiership in Rafael Benitez’s 18-month reign as Anfield manager.
And as they prepare for tomorrow’s game with Wigan, Liverpool have now strung together five successive league wins and seven unbeaten matches in all competitions without conceding a goal.
The club’s all-time record is 10 straight victories without a goal being conceded - in the 1987-88 championship-winning season.
Gerrard struck his 11th goal of the campaign to secure the victory at the Stadium of Light, and clearly relished the future as Benitez strives to build on the best spell under his management.
Gerrard said: “It’s an open secret that the manager is trying to bring in new players, and January is just around the corner - when there will be some special players joining the club.
“I can’t wait. The boss has said he wants a right sided player, and from my point of view that will allow me to go back into the centre of midfield, and he also wants a new central defender.
“All that is hardly a secret anymore. As for our current form, this run is excellent.
“We didn’t pull up any trees at Sunderland, but we were professional and did the job. Now we aim to keep it going.”
With Djibril Cisse expected to be back in the squad for the Wigan game, having been left behind for the Sunderland trip, sources at Anfield have sought to end suggestions of a rift between manager and player following the Cisse’s open display of frustration when he was substituted at Man City last weekend.
That incident, and Benitez’s decision to leave Cisse out on Wednesday, instantly prompted suggestions that the player was on his way out of the club.
Benitez denied any such thing after the victory on Wearside and a Liverpool source said: “Selling Cisse would not make sense in January.
“We are still in the Champions League and where would any club find a replacement for their top scorer who was not cup tied in European competition?
“It would not make sense for anyone to sell a player of such quality in the transfer window with the European Cup still to be contested.”
Gerrard’s “special players” seem likely to include Benfica’s £8million-rated winger Simao Sabrosa, who the Portuguese club accept they will be selling in January and who Liverpool almost signed in the summer.
And it is likely now that Jerzy Dudek will leave Anfield next month, to protect his World Cup place with Poland. He could move in the opposite direction to Benfica, where manager Ronald Koeman is a former Feyenoord team mate of the goalkeeper.
Benitez will also sign a centre-back, and it is understood that Spartak Moscow’s Serbian star Nemanja Vidic - who Liverpool have already bid for - has told his advisors he wants to join the European champions rather than Fiorentina.
Meanwhile, Real Betis have struck a deal with Liverpool to sign Florent Sinama-Pongolle, but also have the option to land Portuguese hit-man Helder Postiga having reached agreement with his club, Porto.
They will only sign one of the two players and the decision will now come down to manager Lorenzo Serra Ferrer as Betis vice president Angel Martin explained.
“The agreement with the clubs has been reached, both for Postiga and Sinama, but obviously it’s a decision that the manager must take,” stated Martin.
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