Lions tried to sign more overseas players

Millwall manager Gary Rowett has revealed he he has tried to sign players from overseas clubs in recent months.

The Lions currently have three in their ranks who were born or started their careers overseas – but have found it hard to watch non British players because of lockdown rules in recent months.

And Rowett has tried during the summer to add to those three – Bartosz Bialkowski of Poland, Jon Dadi Bodvarsson of Iceland and Maikel Kieftenbeld of the Netherlands.

He was asked at Tuesday’s fans’ forum whether he had looked at players on the continent, because they can sometimes be got more cheaply than in the British Isles.

Rowett said: “We’ve got lots of targets. We’ve done a lot of work identifying those sort of players [from overseas].

“But this summer it’s been very hard because of [lockdown regulations]. We have made offers we felt would be very, very good for the team and the club made a trip to Holland to see a player who – it has been well-documented – is being looked at by other clubs.

“Unfortunately their valuation did not fit our evaluation.

“When you’re spending money, you want players to be understanding of the culture and what’s required.

“We have targeted players from Europe, but deals haven’t been right – or they decided not to pursue the option. It’s something we want to be better at.

“But we want to bring in people who improve the team – not just for the sake of the money being spent.”

Chief executive Steve Kavanagh added: “It is important to say that it has been difficult because of the restrictions. We have made one trip to Belgium – but other than that it has been hard. We would not take a player from an overseas club when we haven’t seen him in action.”

Rowett added that he is still deciding what to do about Jon Dadi Bodvarsson, who has another year to run on his contract.

“He is our player and my opinion he needs to get his career back on track,” said the manager. “If he had the chance to play elswhere, it is probably in his interest.

“Sometimes you get a really good player who works really hard but things do not work out and you have to make the best of the situation. It could be something like with Benik Afobe – where we are not paying all the wages. It is the same with our players. We have to make a reasonable business decision. We are not going to give players away just so that they can play football.”