Former Fulham forward Louis Saha has saluted his successor Aleksandar Mitrovic’s magnificent goalscoring exploits – and predicted the Serbian striker can score more than forty goals this season.

The French striker became an instant hit at Craven Cottage as he scored 32 goals in all competitions as Jean Tigana’s side stormed to the Division One title in 2000-01. Mitrovic is the first Fulham striker to better that tally and Saha told the Daily Mirror that he believes the sky is the limit for Fulham’s current number nine.

“I think he’ll get mid-40s which will be amazing. The momentum tends to drop a little bit at the end of the season, unless you score many, many penalties! But Fulham are in such great form that it seems at times like it’s effortless for them.

He can achieve everything. When you have that platform of already being on 34 goals, yes you can definitely reach 50 but realistically I think he will score maybe ten more. And he can certainly be pleased with that.

He’s shown he’s a top striker wherever he’s been. He’s got an amazing number in a really tough league. There’s a lot of modern players now, for instance fake wingers that don’t cross balls. So to have a number nine that is scoring that many goals, a kind of old-fashioned type, it shows he’s very clever as to where he positions himself. He’s showed a lot of consistency and that he’s a top, top striker. It’s been an amazing year for him.”

Saha also praised Fulham for the way they have responded to being relegated from the Premier League last year and feels that they can break the yo-yo spell of recent years under Marco Silva.

“I think they’ve reacted perfectly. When you start to yo-yo as a club, sometimes it can hit confidence but I don’t think that’s the case with them. Obviously they have players on top form. The Championship is a very, very tough league but they’ve shown they can handle it. I’m not surprised because it’s a club that has the right mentality and look for a solution. I think they’ve really reset and found the best way to get back to the Premier League with the right ammunition.”