Coventry boss Robins: We got lucky break with Millwall’s disallowed goal

BY RICHARD CAWLEY & KAI BENNETT

Mark Robins admitted that Millwall’s disallowed goal just before half-time should have stood.

Tom Bradshaw looked to have given the Lions the lead just before the break when he nodded home a Scott Malone delivery, but the referee’s assistant chalked it off for offside by Matt Smith.

Lions boss Gary Rowett revealed post-match that he had watched the incident back a number of times and that both of his attackers were onside.

Coventry manager Robins said: “They will feel aggrieved because it looked, to all intents and purposes, like a good goal. Relief from our perspective, on that score. But really, on the balance of play, got to really be happy with a point.

“We played some good football and took the lead. We conceded a poor goal. But you’re playing against a really good side. These are a different proposition than when we played last year – ‘a’ because they’ve got better players and ‘b’ the crowd is back. They play in a way that demands certain things from you. Both sets of players performed at a really high level. It was a good advert for Championship football.

“It could have been three each..it could have been four each.

“You could see the energy they have expended again, is incredible. The keeper [Bialkowski] has made some decent saves and we’ve missed the target a couple of times.

“We’ve thrown bodies in front of things. They’ve not had too much after the first half, but they looked dangerous. They are always a threat. They play a really good brand of football. They’ll still be thinking about last season’s games we played against them. Last season it was totally different circumstances, playing them on the last day of the season and there was nothing really on the game. The game on January 2, they’d had a lot of illnesses or injuries. No crowd in here…it becomes very partisan.”