Aleksandar Mitrovic insisted that it is not time for Fulham to celebrate despite following up his player of the month award with the winner at Sheffield Wednesday yesterday.
The Serbian striker scored his ninth goal in as many games to take the Whites to within two points of second-placed Cardiff but urged his Fulham team-mates not to get two excited as the Championship automatic promotion race looks set to go down to the wire. Mitrovic fired home a Ryan Sessegnon cross to eventually give the visitors a deserved lead at Hillsborough and acknowledged the importance of the three points when speaking to FulhamFCTV after the final whistle:
A very big win. A very big three points. The first half was really tough against tough opponents. They defended really well, they were compact. They were very tough to play against. We found a way to score the goal and we won the game, so that is the most important. Now we have to recover and prepare for the next league game on Tuesday.
The on-loan Newcastle forward praised his side’s patience as Fulham had to wait until the last quarter of a contest they had largely dominated before taking the lead.
We had good chances but we couldn’t score. So we had to stay patient, keep going, stay positive and to try to find a way to put the ball in the net. When we found it, it was a great team action and it was a big goal because we knew that we needed a result. We are very happy, but we don’t have time to celebrate. We have to recover and prepare for Tuesday.
Mitrovic played down the importance of his player of the month award, revealing just how happy he was to be playing regular football at Craven Cottage and stressing that getting the wins for Fulham was most important to him.
Personal awards are always nice to get but I am a team player and I’m even more happy when the team plays good and win the game. Since I came, the team has played really well and I really enjoyed playing on the pitch. I have scored goals. The team is creating chances for me, we have a really good relationship between us – it is very nice to go on the training ground and to see all the people and players. We knew where we want to be at the end of the season – and we will try to give everything to be in the first two places. Now, we have made a small step towards that, but we are not there – we have to keep fighting.
Fulham will now switch their focus to Tuesday night’s home game with Reading and Mitrovic knows not to take the Royals lightly, even though they might be battling against relegation this season.
It is hard to play against every team in this league so, like I say, every game until the end of the season is a final. We have to go out there with this mentality to try and win every game. It is going to be hard – it won’t be easy – but that’s football, that’s the Championship, that’s why this league is really interesting, so we have to stay hungry, to keep fighting and we will see what is going to happen.
