• Liverpool manager says 'there is no doubt' club will spend • 'We want to bring in players who can assist in scoring goals'

Brendan Rodgers has reiterated that Liverpool will strengthen their squad in January, although he doubts the club will be able to afford "top players" in the transfer window.

The Liverpool manager had claimed before last Saturday's 3-1 defeat by Aston Villa at Anfield that he did not consider finishing fourth in the Premier League to be the height of the club's ambitions this season. However, he now admits reinforcements this winter, especially in attack, are necessary.

Rodgers has relied heavily on Luis Suárez to provide a creative and scoring threat after failing to sign another forward during the summer transfer window. Liverpool have been linked with a £10m move for Barcelona's David Villa but Rodgers is not concerned with "pie in the sky" speculation.

"There is no doubt we will get reinforcements in and there is no doubt that we will get the backing, but it will come down to two things – the availability and affordability of players," he said. "I see lots of names bandied about that are pie in the sky because there won't be too many top players moving in January as clubs want top money.

"But there is no doubt that we want to bring in goals and we want to bring in players who can assist in scoring goals. If we can do that then that will set us up and then we can really reinforce again when the market opens up in the summer."

Liverpool had overcome their worst start to a league campaign in more than a century ahead of the defeat by Villa and Rodgers talked up a concerted push towards the top three, but they sit 12th in the table ahead of Saturday's home game against Fulham.

The former Swansea manager has often said that he regards his first season in charge as a rebuilding process and is therefore unlikely to pursue any expensive deals in January that could take a large chunk out of his budget and possibly be detrimental to any long-term progression.

"There is a bigger picture for sure and it goes back to affordability," Rodgers said. "We will spend money in January to try and bring fresh faces into the group. The reality is: all the names bandied about, are they going to be available? Certainly we will bring in what we can and then we will revisit it again.

"All our problems were never going to be solved in this window because the January window is the least productive and the least movement goes on there.

"But we will look to solve some of our problems then and then we will look to revisit it in the summer knowing that in the summer we will be in a much better place than we were the previous summer."