Real Mallorca midfielder Cleber Santana has urged his side to make the most of home advantage against Numancia.

However, the club look to be making some forward progress with draws against Osasuna and Deportivo La Coruna after losing their opening match 3-0 to Valencia, and Santana believes it is now time to push on further.

"We are picking up points with the draws and now we have to win at home. We must be calm and work to improve," said the Brazilian, who joined on loan from Atletico Madrid in the summer.

Mallorca have won each of their three home encounters with Numancia down the years, but Santana is anticipating a tough encounter at the Ono Estadi on Thursday night.

"They (Numancia) are a difficult team and as such we have to aim to play a good game and end up with the win. We have to take advantage that we are playing at home and be very focused," he added.

Mallorca coach Gregorio Manzano has named a 19-man squad for the match with defender David Navarro absent through suspension and injury ruling out goalkeeper German Luz and left-back Ayoze Diaz.

In the same way that Mallorca will be looking at Thursday's match to kick-start their campaign, Numancia will also probably have pinpointed this clash as a potential three-pointer when the fixture list came out - not least because it came following matches against Barcelona, Real Madrid and Villarreal.

To their credit the Segunda Division champions managed to pick up three points from those games courtesy of their opening weekend win over Barca, but they also gave Madrid and Villarreal a run for their money before ending up empty-handed.

This weekend's home defeat to Villarreal came after the Yellow Submarine fought back from a goal down before Joseba Llorente netted a 77th-minute winner, and Numancia captain Cesar Palacios told AS: "Points have slipped away against big teams but we know that the season is very long and we have to continue working with the same intensity.

"It's good for us that we have a midweek game to help us get over the disappointments of the last two games, where we have not been able to pick up points because of small details," he added.

"We must go to Mallorca thinking that it is the most important game."

Numancia coach Sergio Kresic has called up midfielder Dimas Delgado as the veteran Croatian tactician looks to get one over on his former club, having been in charge of Mallorca for part of the 2001/02 season.

Dimas, who was a key member of the Pep Guardiola-led Barcelona reserve side last season, takes the place of Alvaro Anton.