Lions can’t produce another big second-half display as Championship play-offs look a bridge too far

BY DANIEL MARSH

Big second-half performances at the Den have become a staple of Millwall’s season. It feels as though there have been countless occasions this year when the Lions have moved through the gears after the break to win matches.

But unfortunately the Lions couldn’t repeat that feat on the night they needed it most.

Joel Piroe stunned the Den with a snapshot that whizzed past Bart Bialkowski just seconds after the interval to send Millwall’s play-off hopes up in smoke after a fairly tepid first half.

And as much as Gary Rowett’s side huffed and puffed in the final half an hour, they couldn’t muster up the response they needed to stay in the promotion mix.

While stranger things have happened, it now feels like a bridge too far for Millwall to gatecrash the Championship’s top-six. The South Londoners are still four points off sixth spot – an identical position to the one they were in at the start of the night – but with so many clubs still in the chasing pack, and most with games in hand, it looks like the Lions’ promotion aspirations have fizzled out in April for the third consecutive season.

In many ways, Millwall’s recent run is pretty much the perfect embodiment of how the last three years in SE16 have gone. The Lions have had no problems getting themselves right into the mix for that elusive golden ticket to the Premier League. But they just seem unable to take that final step when things get real at the business end of the season.

The Lions headed into last weekend’s match at Luton Town knowing that they needed a seven or nine-point haul from their next three fixtures to realistically stay afloat in the race for a play-off berth.

Picking up four points from nine – or potentially even fewer – just isn’t going to hack it at this stage of the season.

When you consider that Millwall didn’t really look like promotion contenders at all a couple of months ago, there’s no shame in that. And they certainly deserve real credit for clawing their way back into the play-off picture during a really challenging period when a clutch of key personnel were injured.

But it’s hard not to feel like Millwall have missed a real opportunity to finally take that next step this time around – particularly with such a kind fixture list and big players back and champing at the bit for the run-in.

Although with that being said, Swansea certainly didn’t look like a team who have been languishing in the lower echelons of the Championship for most of the season when they got going for a prolonged spell in the second half.

There was certainly an air of frustration around SE16 as the Lions rallied to try and fight back. George Saville, Benik Afobe and Jed Wallace all spurned golden chances inside the final half an hour.

And just days after Luton were gifted a fortunate equaliser that went in off the back of Jake Cooper, a second-half effort that took a nick of a Swansea player drifted agonisingly wide of the post.

In hindsight, this maybe felt like a game too far for the Lions, with Rowett admitting after the match that he toyed with tinkering with his team ahead of the crunch clash.

Instead he opted for an unchanged line-up and too many players had an off-night.

The squad deserve better than another near-miss after working wonders to rekindle Millwall’s season when they appeared to be drifting into mid-table obscurity at the turn of the year.

However, the onus is now on Millwall to bounce back and finish the season on a high before making another attempt to muscle in on the Championship’s big-hitters next year.

There are still six games left but bar winning them all, it’s probably a safe bet that one eye can now start to tentatively turn towards next season. Regardless of what could have been this year, Millwall would have still had a massive summer ahead of them.

It now seems pretty much a foregone conclusion that Jed Wallace will take his final bow at the Den later this month with his deal set to expire in the summer. He was withdrawn for the final 15 minutes of the match with Millwall chasing an equaliser, something that would have previously been deemed unthinkable.

But the Lions will have to get used to not being able to call on his services. Other attacking names are also set to depart in May when their loan deals end – meaning the biggest attacking overhaul in years is on the cards at the Den.

That might not be the worst thing in the world. Goals are the currency of choice in the Championship and despite flirting with the play-offs on a regular basis over the past three years, Millwall have been poorer than most.

Once again it was that extra bit of quality in the final third that proved to be Millwall’s Achilles heel on Tuesday night.

It’s been alluded to by Rowett, the players and fans numerous times throughout this season and previous ones. Until that issue is resolved, it’s hard to see Millwall taking that next step.

There’s rarely a dull season in SE16, where challenging for the play-offs in the second tier has almost become the norm for Millwall fans. Realistically, the Lions have probably fallen just short again. But this year’s attempts really deserve to be commended, even if Tuesday night did feel like a pretty flat ending.

STAR MAN
Danny McNamara. Never stopped running, even though he was left marooned on the right at times.

BEST MOMENT
Ollie Burke’s driving run to the byline had Swansea bamboozled – but his astute cut-back was taken off Sheyi Ojo’s toe at the back post.