LIAM Moore believes Reading will have to stand up to Cardiff City’s physicality when the sides clash at Madejski Stadium tomorrow night (8pm).

Royals are unbeaten in four Championship matches and will be looking for a third straight victory when they host Neil Warnock’s in-form Bluebirds.

And Moore is anticipating a difficult night against Cardiff’s powerful players as Warnock’s men seek a fifth successive win – a run that has taken them to second in the table with a six-point cushion over Bristol City in third.

“Cardiff look big and physical and they’re scoring goals,” declared centre-back Moore. “I think it will make for an interesting game given the way we play and they play.

“We don’t know what Cardiff’s game plan will be, but we need to find the key to unlock them, we need to stand up to them. Hopefully we can win that one.”

Reading pulled further away from the drop zone with back-to-back victories over Barnsley and Sunderland in the past week to move up to 14th in the table and nine points off the play-offs.

But they will come up against a title-chasing Bluebirds side in scintillating form with six wins in their last eight games under Warnock.

“We’ll take it one game at a time and I think we do that very well,” declared Moore.

“We have different tests all the time. Barnsley tried to press us high whereas Sunderland dropped off.”

He added: “Personally I was very happy to have a couple of days off after Sunderland. It’s been a tough few weeks and we’ve put a lot of input into it and had a decent run, so it was good for the lads.

“I think we can kick on even more as a team now and push up the table. It’s been frustrating time. I feel we’ve played quite well, but not had a cutting edge or scored goals as often as we would have liked.

“We’ve been down near the bottom, but we knew what we needed to do, stuck together and in the last four or five games things have fallen into place.

“We’re not going to take our foot off the pedal now, this busy Christmas period is the time to really push on.”

Boss Jaap Stam has no fresh injury concerns ahead of tomorrow’s clash and could recall fit-again winger Garath McCleary back into the squad.

And Moore believes Royals are reaping the benefits of a settled team after Stam selected the same starting XI for the third match running for the 3-1 win at Sunderland last Saturday.

“It may have been the first chance he’s had to pick the same sides for three games,” quipped Moore “We’ve had a terrible record with injuries. It seems like every time someone comes back someone else drops out.

“When we’re fully fit and firing there will be great competition in the squad for places and we’re getting there.

“If the lads are winning games it’s normal the team stays the same. If not, we have players with good ability to step in.”

John Swift, George Evans, Jordan Obita Callum Harriott, Joseph Mendes and Stephen Quinn are still sidelined with injury