Fulham boss admits Mitrovic has been badly missed

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Fulham boss Marco Silva admits the return of Aleksandar Mitrovic cannot come soon enough.

Mitrovic still has two games of his eight-match ban to serve following his sending-off at Manchester United for pushing referee Chris Kavanagh.


His replacement Carlos Vinicius has struggled to replicate the threat of the Serbian hitman and Silva has turned to wingers Bobby De Cordova-Reid, Dan James and Harry Wilson to act as makeshift forwards.

The decision paid off in the wins over struggling Leeds and Everton, but against Aston Villa on Wednesday the Whites struggled up front in a 1-0 defeat.

Mitrovic will return for the game at Southampton on May 13 – after Fulham have faced Manchester City and Liverpool.

“He scored 11 goals before the World Cup break and of course we are stronger with him,” Silva said.

“With Carlos not delivering what we expect it is important we keep working with him, but I have had to find other solutions with Bobby and Daniel.

“It gave us a bit more pace in the front line and made us more dynamic, but when we are under pressure and need a player to link the game and be a bit more physical in attack I would prefer to have Mitro.”