Valencia striker David Villa had been tipped as a strong contender for a move to Liverpool but this has been denied by Reds boss Rafa Benitez. The 27-year-old has been strongly linked with a move away from Spain this summer but Benitez ruled out any approach for the Spanish international.

"David Villa, he is not our target," he stressed.

"We have already signed Johnson, an international for England," he said.

"He is a good signing and Andriy Voronin is coming back (from a loan spell with Hertha Berlin), he was one of the best players in the German league, so we have two good additions. You never know in football, we still have some time and we need to keep working on other names.

"We have fantastic players and hopefully we can keep the level of last year and see with one or two additions we could improve a little bit. At the moment we are very pleased."