Aquilani has travelled with the team to Craven Cottage and, if fit, would be restricted to another late substitute appearance.

The Italian impressed during his cameo display at Arsenal, and Benitez says: “I think he did well against Arsenal. We were thinking how long he could play. It was okay and it was an open game and that’s better for a player of quality like him. You saw his vision in the final third.

“He’s a different kind of player to Xabi. You can see he’s more offensive, he likes to get forward more than Xabi. He’s a player with quality and he has experience at international level so I don’t think he will be under too much pressure.

“Maybe if he makes one or two mistakes, people will say ‘oh, he’s feeling the pressure’, but if he scores goals people will talk about quality so it depends on the first games.”

Aquilani’s instant impact was not a surprise to his new team-mates or his manager.

“When you train with a player for one week, the players know his quality,” says Benitez. “They know he is a top-class player.

“I remember the first training session and we were doing keeping possession and every time he was passing the ball with one touch and he could see a player was available. They could see he is a player with quality.”

When Liverpool last visited Fulham in April, a last-gasp Yossi Benayoun goal earned a 1-0 victory to leave the travelling fans sang ‘we’re gonna win the league’ long into the night.

It never quite happened, of course, with United eventually holding off Liverpool’s thrilling championship challenge.

And Benayoun accepts another three points is imperative this afternoon if Benitez’s side are to rekindle this season’s title hopes.

“I hope we do it earlier this time!” says Benayoun. “But if we are going to do that, we’ll have to work as hard as we did against United. We knew we were under pressure but we spoke between ourselves and hoped our quality would come through.

“To be in the situation that we were after winning at Fulham last season, we have got to work hard. But if we keep playing as a team and showing our quality, we can keep giving something back to the supporters.

“We stepped up a level against United but that was only a return to the level we were playing at last season. I don’t know whether it is a surprise to some people but maybe you can see why they think like that after we lost four games and played badly.

“We heard everyone saying we didn’t have the confidence or quality to beat United or enough depth in the squad to win games of that importance. But hopefully we have shown everyone that is wrong. We still have lots of quality here.

“But we can’t waste what we achieved last Sunday. We have got to make that win a turning point and believe that we can beat anyone. We’ve got to keep trying to play well but it won’t be easy at Fulham.”

Both Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard were yesterday named the 23-man shortlist for FIFA World Player of the Year, having earlier in the week been included among the nominations for the European Footballer of the Year award.

“It’s really good and important for the club,” says Benitez. “We know they are top-class players. They deserve to be there.

“It’s positive to have two there, and it could be more in the future. We are really pleased for them.”