The Spaniard played half a game in the Europa League win over Trabzonspor last week and Hodgson feels that the time could be right for Torres to be in from the kick-off.
"I thought Fernando looked very good against Trabzonspor and he will be all the better for the 45 minutes," Hodgson told his club's official website.
"He almost scored with his first touch of the ball and we are really pleased that Fernando is back. We know what he can produce and he didn't look like he was short of fitness.
"He showed he is back to his best and his energy and enthusiasm were vital for us. It did make a difference but when you have players of his class it does make a difference.
"We know what we've got in Fernando and it's really nice to see him back. It's important now we manage his fitness because it's quite early for him to be playing now.
"We have got until Monday until we play again so those days will do him good.
"Luckily we were able to rest some important players against Trabzonspor so we will have a lot of them coming back in on Monday night. It was a bit of a gamble in some ways but we won the game.
"They have had a longer rest and that is advantageous to us. We will have on paper at least a stronger team than what we had out on Thursday."
City have looked like a group of players rather than a team so far this season but Hodgson is under no illusions as to the kind of threat Roberto Mancini's team pose.
"They had a very good result in Europe on Thursday so they will take confidence from that," he added.
"Manchester City are one of the main contenders for the title this year and not just a contender for the top-four.
"If you spend over £100 million on players over the course of not even a year then you expect them to be the stars that you thought they were when you brought them.
"If you look at their team on paper it really is a star studded line-up with a lot of quality players. They are playing at home and they would expect to be very strong this year.
"They have the likes of [Mario] Balotelli, [James] Milner and Yaya Toure who cost nearly £70m between them, so that just shows how strong a unit they have.
"We know that and maybe we will have to be at our best to keep them at bay.
"But, in saying that we have the likes of Steven Gerrard, Glen Johnson, Dirk Kuyt, Javier Mascherano, Daniel Agger and Martin Skrtel to come back in so we have a lot of quality too.
"I'm not envious of Manchester City's spending because we've got the makings of a very good squad here at Liverpool.
"We will go to Manchester with confidence and hope to build on our second half performance against Arsenal last Sunday.
"I'm pretty confident we will give them a good game."
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