No Loan Deal For Cisse

Liverpool boss Rafael Benitez says Djibril Cisse will only be allowed to leave Anfield if an interested club are prepared to finance a permanent deal.

Liverpool signed Cisse from Auxerre for a record club transfer fee of £14m in July 2004, but the 25-year-old forward spent last season on loan at Marseille.

"If another club wants him, they must buy him. We don't want another loan," Benitez told Liverpool's website.

French international Cisse has two years left on his Liverpool contract.

Cisse has broken his leg twice in the last three years, first in 2004 and then in a friendly for France against China last year just before the World Cup in Germany.

LiverpooL Set To Seal Torres Move

Liverpool are set to see off interest from Manchester United to seal the signing of Fernando Torres for a club-record £25m this week.

Reds boss Rafa Benitez has made the Atletico Madrid striker his number one transfer target this summer and looks set to get his man despite late interest in the 23-year-old from United.

It is thought the Spanish international would prefer a move to Anfield, where he would team up with fellow countrymen Benitez, Xabi Alonso and Pepe Reina, to spearhead the Reds' strike force next season.

There are reports Benitez will offer Atletico Luis Garcia or Djibril Cisse as part of the deal in order to reduce the amount Liverpool will have to fork out, although it is thought the Reds are willing to pay as much as £25m for Torres - a figure that easily eclipses the £14m spent on Cisse in the summer of 2004.

United's interest in Torres is long-standing and reports have suggested Sir Alex Ferguson now wants the forward after his bid to land Italian international Fabio Quagliarella from Sampdoria stumbled over the weekend.