Mark Noble insists West Ham must improve results against some of the Premier League's strugglers if European football is to return to the club.Noble missed the home clash with Birmingham, where he had been selected as a substitute, after feeling out-of-sorts in the warm-up, but he is desperate to get back into the action on Saturday at Fulham, and determined to help the Hammers to a victory.

"We need to take the points from these games," Noble told the Newham Recorder. "They are the games that are going to get you into the European places, but Fulham is going to be a very tough game.

"They got an unlikely win against Aston Villa, so we need to go there with a strong team and put a performance in."

The arrival of Scott Parker during the summer suggested that Noble may have found it more difficult to carve out a regular place in the West Ham first team.

But a persistent knee injury for the former Newcastle midfielder has meant that Noble has been involved in 20 of the Hammers' 25 Premier League games so far this campaign.

Last season, it was Noble's arrival in the first team that helped spark the revival and survival in the Premier League, and the midfield star believes that West Ham should treat this year's run-in in the same way.

"We need to push on and get in the European places and in that respect we have nothing to lose," he said. "It is a similar situation to last season at this stage.

"Everyone thought we were down so we just cracked on and gave it everything, and now nobody expects us to get into Europe, so we can really give it everything to put the points on the table."

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