Fulham goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer has stated that Fulham will head to Loftus Road on Saturday full of confidence following the Team's recent win over Stoke City.
Schwarzer is far from underestimating the questions QPR will ask his Team, but the goalkeeper believes Fulham have the answers to bring all three points back to SW6, and strengthen their claim for a place in the top half of the Barclays Premier League table.
“It’s another massive game,” said Schwarzer of Saturday's London derby against QPR. “Not only are they our local rivals, it’s a massive game for us to try and get another three points and move ourselves even further away from the bottom half of the table and work ourselves into the top half.
“The results away from home haven’t been that great, of course I’m not going to lie about that, and it’s not through lack of trying and effort, it’s just the way it is at the moment and we need to try and work on it.
“You know we’re going to go there [Loftus Road] with all of the self-belief that we had against Stoke and try and play like we did in patches or most of the game and hopefully we can get three points.
“You know it can be a very tough game because QPR are not going to let us go there and win the game, in particular with the history between the clubs and now obviously with the Manager who is there as well, Mark Hughes.
“There is going to be extra spice to it as well and we just have to concentrate on playing football as best as we possibly can and hopefully get three points."
Fulham's defence will of course be playing against a very familiar face on Saturday and Schwarzer knows the threat Bobby Zamora will pose at Loftus Road.
“He [Zamora] was here for three and a half years, so we all know him very well, and I’m sure he’ll have a bit of a moan to us on the pitch like he always does!
“He’s a top quality striker, he’s got some fantastic qualities and his ability to score goals is very good and we know we need to be on top of our game to contain him.”
Fulham reside on 30 points ahead of Saturday's contest and Schwarzer stated that the Team is aiming to reach the 40 point mark as quickly as possible before casting their thoughts towards achieving another impressive top ten finish.
“We all know that as time has gone by its proven that 40 points is generally the points that you need and you know I’m not going to lie – we’ve always had that mindset that we get to 40 points as quickly as possible," said Schwarzer.
“Once we do that we can then start to look forward and up the table and that’s what we’ve done every other season since I’ve been here at the Club.”