Newcastle defender Mike Williamson is confident that the club can rekindle their challenge for a top-six finish.
Defender says Newcastle are taking every game as they come
Newcastle defender Mike Williamson is confident that the club can rekindle their challenge for a top-six finish.
The 28-year-old is keen to take each match as it comes in the belief that the Magpies can keep up with the leading pack, starting with QPR at home on Sunday.
United currently sit in seventh spot in the Premier League standings - just two points behind Liverpool and wins against Bolton and champions Manchester United has given the club a real opportunity of qualifying for Europe.
Williamson said: "It's a cliche, but we are taking every game as it comes.
"For me personally, when you start getting carried away with targets and looking where we could finish, it just gets a bit too much.
"You take every day as it comes and then come the last game of the season, we will see where that brings us."
The former Wycombe and Watford player has formed a reliable partnership with Fabricio Coloccini in the centre of defence in the absence of the injured Steven Taylor.
And he now hopes that the club can continue to defy the odds and prove the critics wrong by finishing the season as strongly as they started it when they went 11 games unbeaten.
Honest
"People were waiting for the bubble to burst, but we have just got an honest group of lads - although saying there are no superstars after the goals the other day, you would beg to differ," Williamson said.
"But we have just got an honest group and we know if we carry on working hard and applying ourselves in the way we do, we have got goals in the team and we have got a back four and a midfield which can keep clean sheets.
"Everybody needs a bit of luck along the way. Even the top teams go through sticky periods like we have done, but no, I am not really surprised.
"I know how hard the lads worked in pre-season, the togetherness when they were away, and you just feel the bond we have had for the last couple of years.
"It's just carried on."
