Intro:

Liverpool coach Brendan Rodgers looks ahead to his side's visit to Newcastle United on Saturday (1st November).

Script:

SOUNDBITE (English) Brendan Rodgers, Liverpool coach:
(On not having to 'protect' Mario Balotelli - the Italian striker was involved in an incident with Swansea's Jonjo Shelvey in Tuesday's Capital One cup game)

"I don't know, I don't know. But there's no problem, so... move on. I don't have to protect Mario, he is fine. Yeah, he's fine. Next question. Next! There is no concern, there is no concern, no. There is no concern. Think of a better question. Come on."

SOUNDBITE (English) Brendan Rodgers, Liverpool coach:
(On the injury to Daniel Sturridge)

"I can only concentrate on his injury now and what my medical team, who are fantastic here, are telling me, so he is just in the middle of recovering and we will see the length of time it takes, so I'm not an expert on the genetics or medicine, so I can't comment. All we know is that he had a calf strain on the back of his last injury, and he is working to recover from that."

SOUNDBITE (English) Brendan Rodgers, Liverpool coach:
(On the recent upturn in Newcastle United's form)

"Yeah, I thought... They obviously had a very good result at home to Leicester (18th October) and then obviously the 2-1 victory (against Tottenham on 26th October) and sometimes you need that as a team and a coach where you get a good result away from home and obviously the Tottenham result was an excellent result for them and the game last night (2-0 win at Manchester City 29th October), I thought they were outstanding. A lot of young players come in and Alan's (Alan Pardew, Newcastle United coach) changed it about a wee bit and probably looking at our game at the weekend but, I thought they thoroughly deserved their win..."

SOUNDBITE (English) Brendan Rodgers, Liverpool coach:
(On playing Newcastle United and the amount of goals that are usually seen in this fixture)

"Well, hopefully only from ourselves. We won 6-0 a couple of years ago (April 2013), so if we can do that again, that would be great, but no, it's always a good, entertaining game between both teams, but for us we'll want to be solid defensively and look to be creative in attack going forward and hopefully that can get us the three points."