Manager Neil Harris has bemoaned the defensive performance Millwall put in against Barnsley this weekend, but he wasn’t going to let it distract him from what has been a great start to the season following promotion last term.
Hosting Barnsley at The Den for the game with Harris being full of praise for our opposition ahead of the game, Millwall went down three one on the day with Lee Gregory drawing us level but only for a period of time and Harris told the official site as he met with the media following the game that simply put we were too soft in defence on the day, but given our efforts so far this term he felt it was more a case of it being one game ‘too far’ for us.
With the international break now hitting, this is clearly a good time to recharge.
‘I think it was a game too far for us. I’m disappointed with the performance. I take responsibility for that, because I picked the team. Individually and collectively, however, those players have been in excellent form and deserved to play. But, if we’re not at our best in every single fixture in the League this season, we’ll get beat – home or away. Today, we weren’t at our best as a defensive unit.’
Harris went on to add.
‘We were too stretched and we gave the ball away too much. Ultimately, if you give good players at this level those opportunities, they’re going to take them. Barnsley deserved to win the game because they took their chances.’
One thing that Harris wasn’t prepared to do though was pick players out individually for their showing as he was determined to keep a ‘no blame culture’ at the club where the side win or lose as a group and he also wasn’t going to overreact to the result, insisting he remained ‘proud’ at our start to life in the second tier this season.
‘The right side of the defence are a little disappointed with a couple of the goals, but in my time here and now, we don’t have a blame culture as this club – we have a learning culture. There’s no blame on anyone specific today, but we were too easy to score against. But, over the course of the first 11 games of the campaign, I’m proud of what my players have achieved.’
Vital Millwall on:
