Lewis Holtby hopes his intense fitness work will benefit him and Rovers in the final nine games – and next season as well.

Holtby’s initiative at the start of lockdown enabled him to work with his long-term physio in Germany, taking a private jet back to his home country as coronavirus began to take hold in the UK.

Fearing being without access to Brockhall, and not wanting to do his rehabilitation from what looked set to be a season-ending knee injury sustained in February in his Manchester flat, the 29-year-old travelled back to his native Germany.

His injury comeback was complete when he played 60 minutes in Thursday’s practice match with Liverpool, and the midfielder is raring to go ahead of next weekend’s game with Bristol City.

And having gone without a proper pre-season last year, joining Rovers in September following his release from Hamburg, Holtby is hoping to benefit from his hard graft behind the scenes.

“I trained my body up to a high standard, I’m hitting high figures on the fitness work,” Holtby told the Lancashire Telegraph.

“I could always run, it was different working alone or with a different team and coming in at the end of September.

“I didn’t give myself the benefit, I always had niggles and was coming in to two games a week from the start which I struggled with.

“I’ve worked really hard, three hours a day, doing extra work after training, so I want to get my body in to the best shape for the upcoming weeks and benefit not just this season but next season as well, because I think we’ll just go straight in to another pre-season.”

The top two tiers of German football were the first prominent European league to return to action last month, albeit behind closed doors.

And despite the initial uncertainty, Holtby says players have soon adjusted to their new surroundings.

He added: “At first it was quite unusual. They have big, big crowds. Hamburg my old club have an attendance of 50,000.

“When you’re hearing yourself shout, and the only noise you hear is the instructions from managers, or players, it was different for them. But after the second or third game they got used to it.

“At the end of the day it’s football and you have to focus on the things on the pitch and just keep the energy high. That was the big difference.

“And the travelling. All the health and security procedures are all very high, but speaking for myself, the lockdown has been released more and more in Germany to a point where it’s almost normal again.

“There’s just a few restrictions but it has been different.”