Christian Benteke can hit target for Liverpool says Kop idol Robbie Fowler
Friday 24 July 2015 06:07, UK
Liverpool heroes Robbie Fowler and Dietmar Hamann have backed Christian Benteke to score plenty of goals for the Reds.
Fowler, who scored 183 goals for the Merseyside club, thinks the Belgium international will be a success at the club after being officially announced as a Liverpool player on Wednesday for a transfer fee of £32.5m.
"I'm absolutely delighted. I think he’s an excellent player, he will get us goals," Fowler told Sky Sports News HQ.
"He’s a proven Premier League player so I’m excited he’s joined. I think we probably needed a player to take a little bit of the burden off a few of the other players as well so hopefully he’ll be a massive success and score loads of goals for us."
Fowler also feels Benteke's physicality could be crucial for Liverpool to create more chances.
"He has scored goals everywhere he’s been," he said.
"He’s a big, strong lad so he’s not going to get knocked off the ball too easily, and when you’ve got a player like that I think he can buy time for the midfield players and even the defenders to get up there and support him so it’s a really good time to be a Liverpool fan."
Dietmar Hamann, who spent seven seasons as a Liverpool player and was part of their Champions League winning side in 2005, agreed with Fowler that Benteke can have a great impact.
"He showed that he more or less single handedly kept Aston Villa in the league last season," he said.
"I’m very excited to see him, I think he could be the final piece in the jigsaw because the problem for Liverpool last season is they didn’t score enough goals.
"Hopefully with him, with the arrival of (Divock) Origi and also Danny Ings I think we’ve got the firepower now to challenge for the top-four position, and not to forget Daniel Sturridge who will hopefully be back at some stage, so I think that’s been the problem last season, not scoring enough goals.
I’m very excited to see him, I think he could be the final piece in the jigsaw.
"There’s enough players now who are capable of doing it, they just need the service but again with the players behind Lallana, Coutinho, Firmino arriving at the club – I expect a lot more from Markovic – I think they should create enough chances for these guys to score."
Hamann and Fowler were speaking at The Setapak School in Kuala Lumpur, the only secondary school for visually impaired children in Malaysia. They were joined by six community coaches from the foundation.
Andrea Cooper, the Head of Foundation for Liverpool FC, spoke of the importance of Liverpool's community events.
"We’ve been running local community programmes for over 20 years so on the tour we’ve been travelling with six expert professional, highly skilled, highly qualified coaches who specialise coaching young people of all backgrounds, disadvantaged backgrounds, and young people with disabilities so truly important to us," she said.
Hamann also thinks Roberto Firmino, one of Liverpool's summer signings, could be a big influence after watching him play in the Bundesliga for Hoffenheim for four seasons.
"He’s a player I know well from Germany," Hamann said.
"He’s been there a number of years and he’s tough so people always talk about a Brazilian coming to the Premier League, can he stand up to the physical challenge?
"That guy is tough. He won’t be shirked or scared or frightened by the physicality of the Premier League and I think he’s got a bit of pace about him."
