Millwall boss provides injury update on star defender Japhet Tanganga

BY MITCHELL HALL

Millwall boss Alex Neil has spoken about the injury which saw star defender Japhet Tanganga withdrawn just 43 minutes into their 2-1 victory over Portsmouth at the Den.

The former Tottenham centre-back suddenly dropped to his knees just minutes before the half-time whistle.

The centre-back seemed to be in some discomfort with his arm, eventually trudging off the pitch in a sling to be replaced by Ryan Leonard. Tristan Crama slotted into central defence, a role he was originally signed for but has rarely played in under Neil.

Neil said: “It looks at the moment as if Tanganga might have cracked a bone in his wrist, so we will get it X-rayed, we will see the extent of it and we will deal with it as best we can.

“It is hard to say just now how long he will be out.”

Millwall did not seem to be impeded by the substitution as they took hold of the game soon after the beginning of the second half through a 57th-minute Mihailo Ivanovic header.

It was then that complacency crept in and the Lions found themselves on the back foot, eventually conceding after a spell of pinball in the box was eventually ended by Andre Dozzell’s scrambling finish.

“My biggest frustration is when we scored,” said Neil. “For the next 10 minutes we got 10 yards too deep.

“The press at the top of the pitch became a little bit loose, they played through us a couple of times at that point and we lost a couple of duels on the edge of the box.

“Things were skating off the top of our heads and there were loose clearances that were not happening earlier in the game.

“When they scored it woke us up and from that point we came back into it we were much more aggressive, we were much more assertive in the match.”

The goal was not the only change that helped rejuvenate Millwall on their way to a winner, as a triple substitution introducing Aidomo Emakhu, Billy Mitchell and Macaulay Langstaff immediately followed the goal.

Neil said: “I was really frustrated because I had three subs lined up to come on when they scored the goal.

“It was a really particular type of game today. Physicality was the order of the day, hence the reason why I was not making changes earlier, because the players I was bringing on were all smaller.

“It was one where I did not want to take that risk, but when they did come on they impacted the game really well.

“We scored another goal and we could have scored more.”