ALEKSANDAR MITROVIC admits the opening month of the season has been a considerable mental challenge, but having opened his Championship account in Tuesday’s historic win at QPR, the Newcastle United striker is confident he can help fire his side to promotion.

Having been sent off on the final day of last season, Mitrovic was suspended for the opening four matches of the current campaign, and even when he returned to action in the EFL Cup win over Cheltenham, he sustained concussion and was forced to sit out the following weekend’s league game with Brighton.

He eventually made his first Championship appearance at Loftus Road on Tuesday, scoring Newcastle’s fifth goal in the 6-0 away win that equalled the club’s biggest ever league success on the road.

Some observers have questioned Mitrovic’s suitability for the Championship, particularly his willingness to give his all in the second tier having been touted as one of the most promising young strikers in Europe when he completed a £13m move from Anderlecht last summer.

However, the 21-year-old insists his motivation is not in question, even if he concedes it has been hard to watch the opening weeks of the season from the sidelines.

“It has been a really frustrating few weeks for me, and it has been hard for me to keep my head right,” said Mitrovic, who scored nine goals in 34 Premier League appearances last season. “But I always knew I would come through okay and the game against QPR proves that.

“It has been hard for me to stay strong in my head, but I knew I just had to wait for my chance and everything would be okay.

“I feel like I can definitely score goals at this level. I know I still have to improve, particularly with my fitness, but I am confident I can score goals this season and help Newcastle win games.

“It obviously helps because I have a lot of good players around me, and that’s important for everybody. There is good competition up front, which is good. There’s Dwight Gayle, Ayoze (Perez) and now Daryl Murphy as well. I like that. We will push each other and get better, which can only be good.”

The battle for Newcastle’s lone-striker spot will be one of the most interesting narratives of the season, with Rafael Benitez boasting an abundance of riches in the attacking positions.

Gayle, who is the Championship’s joint top scorer with four goals, is probably the most natural finisher in the squad, while Perez, who performed superbly on Tuesday night, boasts the best movement.

Murphy is the most experienced in terms of previous appearances in the Championship, but Mitrovic, with his blend of physical strength, aerial ability and shooting prowess, can claim to possess the best all-round package when it comes to troubling defences in the second tier.

The Serbia international needs to keep his emotions in check, something he successfully achieved on Tuesday, and also concedes that he is still some way short of full match fitness after his truncated start to the campaign. Once he gets into his stride though, he could be a difficult man to stop.

“I think you could see from the game (at QPR) that I am still not 100 per cent there,” he said. “Physically, my fitness is still not quite at the best level, where I want it to be. I still need a couple more games to get my best level back.

“I will get there though. Some guys have played six or seven games, this was just my second game of the season and by the end, it was getting harder and harder to run. I just need to keep working hard, and then every game will be better and better.”

It is hard to imagine how things could get much better than Tuesday’s display, which saw Newcastle score six goals on their travels for the first time since they won 7-1 at Notts County in the League Cup under Kevin Keegan.

As well as scoring six goals, Newcastle also hit the woodwork twice and had an early effort controversially ruled out for offside, and Mitrovic admits it was an evening when pretty much everything went to plan.

“It was a really amazing night,” he said. “We got everything we wanted, and it felt like pretty much every time we got the ball, we were going forward and looking like we were going to score.

“We scored six goals, but I actually thought we could have got even more because we had shots that hit the crossbar and their goalkeeper made a couple of good saves. Every single player was really amazing, and it was a great mood in the dressing room when we came in after the game.

“Sometimes you have days when everything you try comes off, but it’s unusual to score six goals in a game, especially when you are playing away from home. Sometimes, everything goes perfect, and Tuesday night was that night. Hopefully, we will have more days like that this year.”

Meanwhile, Gayle has been announced as the winner of the Championship Goal of the Month award for August thanks to his free-kick strike against Reading.