Norwich City midfielder Todd Cantwell is relishing the opportunity to play against last season’s Champions League winners Liverpool in the Canaries’ first game of the campaign on Friday.

The 21-year-old has been excellent during pre-season and could be in Daniel Farke’s starting line-up at Anfield.

It will be Norwich’s first match in the top-flight since they were relegated in 2015/16 and they took a while to adjust to the Championship, finishing eighth and 14th in their first two campaigns in the second tier.

However, under Farke’s guidance last term, they romped to the Championship title, winning 27 of their 46 fixtures and only losing six games.

Cantwell, who came through the youth team ranks at Carrow Road, has featured in 24 league games for the club, and is keen to prove his worth in the Premier League. He said: “Some people have said ‘what a horrible first game’ but we’re excited.

I look at it as, we’re in the top league now, we won the Championship, we didn’t win an award to go up, we won the Championship title. “So we want to go out there and show that this is what we’re going to do.

We’re not naive, it’s going to be a very tough game, but you’ve got to play these teams if you want to play in the top league – and we all want to play in the top league.”

Liverpool only lost one Premier League game last season but still finished a point behind champions Manchester City.

Jurgen Klopp’s team are 3.50 to win the Premier League title in 2019/20 while Norwich are 1.83 to be relegated.