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Liverpool have faith in methods for managing their players' fitness

Liverpool first-team coach Mike Marsh has backed the club's fitness programmes, despite the Reds' methods for managing the condition of their players having come in for criticism.

Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers declared that some of his players need two days without full training following matches after Daniel Sturridge picked up a thigh injury during an England training session last month -- two days after he had played 89 minutes in a 1-0 friendly win over Norway.

Three Lions manager Roy Hodgson, though, has suggested that Raheem Sterling's fatigue -- which led to his request to be rested for Sunday's 1-0 defeat of Estonia -- is a result of him being used to an extra day without training after Reds matches.

Marsh, however, says he has complete faith in Liverpool's methodologies for building players up to maximum fitness, and believes it will help the club as they begin to play more and more matches.

"We know it's a tough fixture list with the amount of games and the quality of the opposition so we know it's going to be tough, but the more players we have available the better," he told Liverpool's official website.

"Our fitness programmes have been well documented. We try to recover the players as best we can to prepare for the game. We have a couple of days' recovery after the game and we work with the group of players for the next game.

"We do quite a lot of analysis with the players so we break them up into smaller groups and feed back in different ways."

Liverpool next face the prospect of three matches in a week, with Sunday's trip to Queens Park Rangers followed by a Champions League game at home to Real Madrid on the Wednesday, before they welcome Hull City the following Saturday.