Danny Murphy is counting down the hours to Liverpool's opening pre-season friendly against Wrexham and admits he's really looking forward to the forthcoming tour of North America.

The Reds kick-off their summer programme at the Racecourse Ground on Wednesday and follow that up with a three-match tour of the United States and Canada, which includes games against Celtic, Porto and Roma.

After admitting last week that the players were being worked extra hard in training, Murphy is already feeling the benefits of life under new boss Rafael Benitez and is now itching for the match action to begin.

He says: "Pre-season is one of those times that you just want to get over and done with as quickly as possible. The games are part of that but they are a nice distraction from being put through our paces on the training pitch. They're a nice break and something we all look forward to.

"The American tour will be interesting and I'm really looking forward to it. I've never been over there on a football trip. It'll be interesting to see how their public take to us because we're not sure how much they know about 'soccer' over there and it should be a really good experience.

"The games will be important because, one, it give you a chance to express yourself and two, it's what we're actually training for."