Roque Santa Cruz insists Blackburn are not punching above their weight as they target European qualification - instead insisting they are performing slightly below his expectations.

The Paraguay striker says it will be a major disappointment if Mark Hughes' side do not clinch a UEFA Cup spot.

Blackburn are on a good run of only one defeat in their last 10 league matches, a spell that has propelled them to seventh in the table.

It now looks to be a straight fight between Rovers, Aston Villa and Manchester City for that sixth place - with whoever gets it hoping either Chelsea or Manchester United win the FA Cup to pass on that UEFA Cup qualification spot.

Santa Cruz knows that he needs to start scoring again after failing to find the target in four matches. But, with 15 goals this season, he has already proved his worth - and his last barren spell in November was broken by a hat-trick.

He said: "I'm not worried about it, only about whether we are winning and what we are going to do as a team.

"I have had my chances to score and I'm sure the next goal will come soon.

"But I'm confident we can qualify for the UEFA Cup - that was the idea from the manager when we talked before I joined, and that was the goal from the beginning of the season.

"You could even say we are a bit behind what we expected so we have to keep on winning.

"We expected to win at Newcastle and we expect to win against Fulham tomorrow."

Santa Cruz says he has settled in completely to life in Lancashire since Hughes bought him from Bayern Munich in the summer, and is even becoming something of a hustler on the pool table at Blackburn's training ground.

"He's the best pool player in Paraguay," said Hughes. "Mind you, that's because he's probably the only one."

Santa Cruz's combination of power, speed and skill - he has the muscles of a middle-weight boxer but with the build of an athlete -

is the last thing relegation-haunted Fulham will wish to contend with at Ewood Park on Saturday.

Hughes is quietly confident of dispatching the side managed by Roy Hodgson, one of his predecessors at Ewood Park, after analysing the statistics of Blackburn's 1-0 win at Newcastle last weekend.

"We were better than them in just about every area - the number of tackles, passes, shots, and the distance our players ran. The only statistic where they beat us was in the number of corners," said Hughes.

"We will need to win six out of our last 10 games to have a good chance of qualifying for the UEFA Cup, and the game against Fulham is one of those we would hope to win.

"It's a huge job for Roy but he has made the players get the ball down and pass it a lot more than they did before, so they are trying to play their way out of danger and we must be aware of that."

David Dunn is still a doubt with a calf strain for Saturday. The midfielder will have a fitness test before the match but if he misses out again David Bentley is likely to continue in central midfield.

Centre-back Ryan Nelsen remains sidelined with a hamstring problem.

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