IN HIS first four seasons as Liverpool manager, Rafa Benitez signed no fewer than 49 players. Of those, just six - Peter Crouch, Dirk Kuyt, Pepe Reina, Javier Mascherano, Fernando Torres and Xabi Alonso - have started as many as 25 Premier League games in a single season. Crouch, of course, is now gone and Xabi Alonso is up for sale, which basically implies that, between 2004 and 2007, Benitez was able to add just four bona-fide long-term starters, or one per season.

It's not the kind of return you would expect from a side that he was supposedly going to rebuild and turn into a force. It's not a knock on Benitez' matchday coaching ability - two Champions' League finals speak for themselves - rather it suggests a particular approach to the transfer market which hasn't really yielded the hoped-for dividends.

Until last season, Benitez largely operated a two-pronged strategy. On the one hand, he sought to bring in youth in industrial quantities. Even now, there are no fewer than 18 players 21 or younger on the club's books acquired in the Benitez era. From Nikolay Myhaylov to Miki Roque, from Ryan Crowther to Beslan Idrizaj, from Damian Plessis to Nabil El Zhar, there's a whole galaxy of presumed starlets in and around Melwood, even as Liverpool's once vaunted xcademy sees its talent pipeline grind to a halt. That's the long-term strategy. Short-term, he has shown a preference for signing four "mid-range" players - think Craig Bellamy, Jermaine Pennant, Alvaro Arbeloa and Yossi Benayoun - rather than one star, capable of having an immediate impact.

In some ways, it's curious because when he has whipped out the chequebook - Torres, Xabi Alonso and Ryan Babel come to mind as the three £10 million-plus guys he has brought in - Benitez has had more hits than misses. Indeed, this summer the plan was to bring in a few bona fide stars in the double-digit category - Gareth Barry and Robbie Keane - but that strategy has, thus far, stalled.

Martin O'Neill took a very hard line on Barry - one which could, potentially, backfire, but, thus far, has seen him keep the upper hand - and Liverpool have looked stuck. As for Keane, Tottenham erected the barricades early. The North London club are flush with cash and sources say they won't do a deal until they have identified a successor. Not to mention the fact that, with Dimitar Berbatov also angling for a move, Spurs don't want to be left with a strike force of Darren Bent and 19-year-old Giovani Dos Santos.

Thus, for now, Liverpool's summer haul is looking somewhat sparse: a back-up goalkeeper (Diego Cavalleri), a couple of kids (led by Paris Saint-Germain's 19-year-old striker David N'Gog) and two fullbacks, Philipp Degen and Andrea Dossena. Both provide viable competition for the incumbents, neither looks like the kind of guy who takes you to the next level. The 25-year-old Degen is a tidy player who was slowed by a bad injury at Borussia Dortmund last season, Dossena, 26, earned his first Italy cap last year, his first campaign as a fully-fledged starter. Both have what Benitez calls "tactical sense" in that they are clever players who can put into practice what the manager asks for, though they won't be mistaken for Cafu and Roberto Carlos any time soon.

Barry (unless Benitez does a 180 and sticks with Xabi Alonso) and Keane - or, alternatively, two guys with similar profiles - should complete the squad. To what degree this represents an upgrade over last season remains to be seen. You can debate endlessly about how much better than Xabi Alonso Barry is or is not. Either way, we're talking about a holding midfielder here. As for Keane, in some ways, he would be a curious choice to begin with. With Crouch gone, there is no bona fide centre forward to back up Torres in the 4-3-3 which gave Liverpool some stability and success in the latter part of last season. Kuyt's limitations as a lone striker are obvious by now (he's much better suited to the flank) and the pint-sized Keane can't be expected to lead the line on his own. Which would leave N'Gog, who really is a target man, as the lone alternative: the fact that he is raw, 19 and managed just a single goal in 14 appearances for PSG last season does not inspire confidence.

Benitez likes options and, odds are, he sees Keane as fitting into both a 4-3-3 (in a wide position) and a traditional 4-4-2. He would provide a useful alternative to Kuyt and Babel in the former scheme, but switching back to a 4-4-2 seems fraught with peril as it would reignite the issue of where to put Steven Gerrard. Stick him in the middle and Liverpool have to sacrifice one of their holding midfielders (begging the question of why they've been pursuing Barry all summer), stick him wide and Benitez puts himself back in the firing line of all the ex-professionals-turned-pundits who infect the airwaves. Either way, having finally found a system which suits your best player, it seems counterintuitive to start tinkering again.

At the heart of the problem lies the issue which has dogged Liverpool for the past year: the ownership situation. The fact that Tom Hicks and George Gillett have called a temporary truce shouldn't mislead anyone. They are still embroiled in an acrimonious power struggle (with the folks from DIC waiting eagerly in the wings), one scheduled to return to the fore in the autumn. That's why funds have been scarce at Anfield this summer. A source familiar with the situation at Liverpool maintains there are enough funds to secure both Barry and Keane (or a similar striker) but only if they raise between £15m and £18m from the sale of Xabi Alonso.

All told though, it doesn't look as if Liverpool will be significantly better than last season, which means another campaign between third and fourth place plus possibly a run in the Champions League and a domestic cup. The defence should be stronger with the new arrivals, Martin Skrtel available for the whole season and, possibly, the return of Daniel Agger (sooner or later he's got to be fit again, right?). Torres is going from strength to strength, Gerrard continues to produce in his position, Babel can be expected to improve. But these seem to be baby steps, not the Great Leap Forward which can seriously worry Chelsea and Manchester United. And, even Barry and Keane, should they arrive, probably won't be able to change the fact that Liverpool look headed for another season in which they leave the title fight to others. In the year that Manchester United could match Liverpool's record of 18 league titles, that's not what supporters want to hear.