Charlton skipper Jason Pearce hopes to put Preston loss behind him with victory over Millwall

BY LOUIS MENDEZ

Charlton suffered a rare off day during Sunday’s home defeat against Preston – but skipper Jason Pearce hopes they can put that behind them with victory over Millwall in the South London derby.

The Addicks head to The Den on Saturday looking for a first win against the Lions in eleven attempts – a barren run that stretches back to a 2-0 home victory in 1996 in which current boss Lee Bowyer opened the scoring.

The Championship new boys were well below par against Alex Neil’s Preston side, but Pearce hopes for a strong reaction next weekend.

“Off the back of today’s result and performance, as players we want to put that right,” explained the 31-year-old, whose foul on Jayden Stockley provided Paul Gallagher with the chance to win the game from the penalty spot for the Lilywhites.

“We’ll make sure we work hard in training this week and we’re ready for that challenge.

“If selected, it’ll be great to play against [Millwall]. Last time, we were in League One when we played them home and away and I didn’t get to play. So hopefully I’ll get to play but we’ll see what the manager does. For the club and the players, it’s a massive, massive game.

“We don’t want to forget performances like [against Preston] because you need to learn from it. We’re new in this league. We will learn from it. We’ll reflect on it and we’ll move on and make sure we’re ready for next week’s challenge.

“We have [played teams higher up the division] of late. The positive thing is we have been putting good performances in against those big teams. That’s given us a lot of confidence.

“Today we had an off day, we need to put that behind us quickly and move on to the weekend. It’s going to be a real tough game and a massive derby game. We’ll make sure we’re ready for that.”

PHOTOS: KYLE ANDREWS