James Milner has been buoyed by the return to action of two key Liverpool players.

Captain Jordan Henderson and star striker Daniel Sturridge both came off the bench in the weekend's 1-0 win over Swansea City following lengthy injury absences and their comebacks have occurred at the perfect time for the Reds who embark on a tough run of fixtures over the festive period.

"It is massive," said the midfielder.

"They are two top players and any team in the league would miss them, it is great they are back. You look at the quality of the whole bench, look at the players we have injured, and as I said before you are going to need that with the amount of games we have coming up.

"To challenge and get where we want to be you are going to need a squad of players. With the amount of games we have got coming up and getting into Christmas it is an important time to get some form, hopefully we can keep this form going through Christmas and keep racking the wins up and if we can do that I think we will be in a good point."