Liverpool leave out Torres from squad for Debrecen

Saturday's 2-2 draw against Manchester City meant that Liverpool have endured almost a full calendar month since their last victory in any competition.

On October 25 they beat the Premier League Champions Manchester United 2-0 at Anfield amid talk that their season was finally beginning to spark back into life. Two losses and three draws later, and Rafa Benitez is still clutching at straws, but at least Saturday's result contained some positives for the Spaniard.

"It was a bad start because we tested some players early this morning and Glen Johnson wasn't confident and couldn't start, so we had to move Carra to the right," he told the official Liverpool website. "Then we got everything right and had another problem and another," he said, referring to the early injuries that saw Daniel Agger and Ryan Babel have to leave the game. 

"After conceding two goals the team's comeback was fantastic. We showed great character. We scored our goal and could have got two at the end. With all the problems we had we were still pushing," Benitez continued. "You cannot be happy when you draw at home but when you have a gameplan and you lose Johnson in the morning, then Agger, then Babel. We had to manage but the reaction of the players was fantastic."

Next up is the Champions League, as the squad jetted off this morning to Hungary for an all-or-nothing game against Debrecen. Liverpool left striker Fernando Torres on Merseyside, as well as Ryan Babel. The Spaniard is still recuperating from a groin injury, and Rafa Benitez is mindful that the weekend clash with Everton is a far more important game to have the player fit for, while Babel is still suffering from the collision with Steven Gerrard which forced his substitution on Saturday.

Not that Benitez should be that worried about injuries to his team anymore, since the discovery of the season, Serbian therapist Mariana Kovecevic. Her miracle cure of massaging horse placenta onto afflicted areas appears to have brought Yossi Benayoun, Albert Riera and Fabio Aurelio back to fitness in half the time that they were feared to be out for - all three were on the bench against Man City, and Benayoun scored.

The stark mathematics of Liverpool's Champions League group are such that regardless of the result against Debrecen, the Reds could be out if Lyon lost to Fiorentina in Italy. Benitez has warned that his players must just think about their own game tomorrow. "The message has to be to just concentrate on our game. We will know, maybe we'll have some information, but we have to focus on our job.

"A lot depends on Fiorentina and Lyon, but the main thing for us is to concentrate on our game and see what happens," Benitez concluded. "We have to prepare our game because we don't have any influence over the other one. If we can do our job and win, we'll see." ·