Fulham boss Mark Hughes is happy with their looming Carling Cup tie with Stoke City.

The Club's busy schedule offers Hughes further game time to assess his players and Fulham's Manager is confident the Team can cope with three games in a week so early in the season.

He told fulhamfc.com: "From my point of view, as a new Manager coming in, I want to see the core elements of the Team play as many times as possible.

"That might be different for other managers of other clubs who know their teams inside out. That's a different situation. For me, it helps me if I can see the Team play as many times as I can.

"Physically we recover the players as well as anybody so we never compromise a player by playing them when they're not fully recovered. I feel they can play at this time of the year and it's not an issue.

"I made the point before and after the last round against Port Vale that we're very early in the season and I don't think you need to make that many changes."