Their clash with Newcastle at St James' Park is a 17th v 18th place battle, but victory could shoot them up the Premier League with so many clubs bunched together.

Just three points separate Fulham in 11th spot from bottom club West Bromwich Albion, one win will be enough to get a decent leg-up the table.

Bruce is looking for a response from his players after Tuesday night's shocking 3-0 defeat to Arsenal's youngsters.

And for him there will be no place better to do it than
at Newcastle, the club he supported as a boy and once turned down the chance to manage.

Said Bruce: "We have got some good players but we have to make sure they start turning good performances into points.
"We think we are five or six points away from where we should be – we are among a big group of clubs who are probably saying the same thing.

"If we had beaten Stoke last week we would have been up to eighth or ninth...you've got 11 clubs separated by three points – it's a tight old league.

"Tomorrow's game will be a hard one for us that's for sure.

"I've been impressed with the job Joe Kinnear has done at Newcastle. They got back-to-back wins the other week and put in a very good performance to beat Aston Villa.
"We have to try and be positive going there, and bounce back from a hugely disappointing night at Arsenal.

"While we were beaten by a very good young Arsenal side, we had a lot of experienced players on the pitch who were disappointed they didn't do better."

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