The Wales captain appears to have fallen out of favour after less than a year at Liverpool, who he joined last summer when the Reds triggered a £6million release clause in his Rovers contract.

Bellamy, who turns 28 next month, was a huge success at Ewood Park, scoring 17 goals in the 2005-06 season.

While refusing to reveal whether the striker is on manager Mark Hughes' shopping list, Williams said: "I've no idea if Liverpool want to sell him.

"His name is on everyone's lips because he did very well here."

He added on BBC Radio Lancashire: "It's an open secret we would like another striker at the club."

Whether or not that man is Bellamy, Williams accepts a quality top-forward will command a hefty transfer fee.

"Strikers don't usually come cheap," he said.

"It's unlikely we're going to find a 20-goal-a-season man for £500,000.

"Will we find a striker? I think we will. Obviously, there are names in the frame."

Exactly how much Hughes has to spend could depend on whether the club are able to offload Francis Jeffers in the near future.

The former Everton and Arsenal striker spent the final two months of the season on loan at Ipswich, who have had two bids - the latest believed to be £500,000 - rejected for the once-capped 26-year-old.

Williams said: "Mark has said, on balance, we would be prepared to sell Francis, providing certain things happened in our line-up.

"He probably isn't first choice and that makes Mark come to the view that if we receive the right offer, we wouldn't want to stand in his way.

"To be fair to Ipswich, they've done it properly. They made us an offer - we rejected it.

"They've made an improved offer and we've rejected that, and that's where we stand."

Jeffers joined Blackburn when his Charlton contract expired last summer.

Despite getting him for nothing, Williams insists Rovers are within their rights to demand a fair price.

He said: "We don't think we're being at all unreasonable. There might be a feeling out there that because we got Francis on a Bosman, that we should be lowering our expectation. I just don't get that at all.

"What we don't want to do is price him out of a move."

Another player who will be allowed to leave Ewood Park is former Rovers skipper Andy Todd.

Williams is looking to get back the £750,000 the club paid to Charlton for the 32-year-old five years ago.

"Andy wants first-team football. We have got an abundance of centre-halves," said Williams.

"We'd like to get our money back. What we paid for Andy is well documented.

"We certainly wouldn't want to stand in Andy Todd's way, provided the return for Rovers is fair."

As for further comings and goings at Blackburn, Williams has vowed there will be no wholesale changes.

"We have got ourselves into a position where we've put together, engineered, re-engineered the best squad we've had for a long time here," he said.

"I don't like the idea of changing too many players. The last time we changed too many, it had an adverse effect on the dressing room.

"We don't want to disrupt what we've got. We would quite like to improve what we've got.

"We're not going to spend money on players who aren't going to be genuinely in the mix - squad players if you like.

"We need to spend our money carefully on a player or players who could hopefully improve the first 11 - or certainly first 16."