Millwall boss Gary Rowett: Fired-up Den home crowd helped us wear down West Brom

Millwall manager Gary Rowett felt that a ramped up Den helped push his side on to defeat West Bromwich Albion 2-1 and move into the play-off places.

The Lions are up to fifth in the Championship table after a fourth straight victory.

They were forced to come from behind after Jed Wallace, booed relentlessly on his SE16 return, crossed for John Swift to convert, although it appeared to take a deflection on its way past George Long.

Callum Styles, one of two changes made by the Lions from the team that defeated Watford 3-0, levelled before the break. There was some debate whether there was any contact on Darnell Furlong’s challenge on Scott Malone but referee Andrew Madley awarded a free-kick. Although a Boro player got his head on Andreas Voglsammer’s inswinging free-kick it dropped for the Barnsley loanee, who lifted his finish into the top of the net.

Substitute Tyler Burey had a goal disallowed for offside but the second time he beat Baggies keeper Alex Palmer there was no curtailing of the celebrations.

West Brom’s prospects of leaving with a point were dented by centre-back Kyle Bartley being dismissed for two bookable offences, both in the second half. Albion were forced to play from 85 minutes with 10 men.

It initially looked as though Mason Bennett had held on to the ball for too long before he worked it to the Lions’ left winger, but his low shot squeezed past Palmer at his near post.

Asked by the South London Press whether the ferocious atmosphere helped Millwall’s energy levels after the effort they had already expended in the 3-0 victory over Watford on Wednesday, Rowett replied: “Spot on. It massively helped the team.

“My concern as a manager today was, and I’ve seen it so many times, that you play so well on a Wednesday night in front of the SKY cameras against a tough team – to win so emphatically and have so much energy, atmosphere and spirit – that it’s always hard to do that two days later against a side that I know are not in a great position in the league, but they have great players.

“To start with Jed [Wallace], [John] Swift and Karlan Grant as a front three, they always look dangerous on transitions. We knew that’s what they would try to do.

“They made six changes, I think to add a bit of physicality to their team, to try and deal with us. That makes the result, in some ways, probably even more impressive. They dealt with it in some ways. We had to try two or three different ways to try and win the game.

“I’ll be really honest, I think we just wore them down over a period. I felt they dealt with it for 45 minutes, but then they couldn’t live with our energy levels and the fact we kept making attacking substitutions that kept asking different questions.

“We deservedly won the game in the end.”

West Brom caretaker boss Richard Beale felt that Millwall were awarded the softest of free-kicks for their equaliser, claiming it was “never a foul”.

Asked if he had watched the incident back, Rowett said: “No. But I can argue that Bartley has elbowed [Shaun] Hutchinson quite early on. It’s a bit naughty – he looks at Hutchinson, he elbows him and it should be a straight red card.

“I’m not disagreeing or agreeing with Bealey there, but there were certain instances in the game that could have changed the game a lot earlier. Whether it was a free-kick or not, it was a great finish.

“I just felt we looked likely to win the game, I can’t remember too many clear chances they had. I can remember an awful lot of moments where we have pinned them in and couldn’t find that last little finish. If it had ended at 1-1, I wouldn’t have felt any differently, because the players have given everything to win the game in a very difficult week, and to win it in the 90th minute was really, really sweet and obviously won’t happen all the time.”