Millwall matchwinner Zian Flemming backed to be a Premier League footballer

BY ALEX GRACE

Gary Rowett was delighted to see Zian Flemming end his goalscoring drought during Millwall’s win at Stoke City on Saturday afternoon.

Flemming scored the only goal of the game, his 11th of the season, as the Lions completed a league double over the Potters and consolidated fifth place in the Championship ahead of fixtures against Luton and Norwich next week.

“He’s been such a good player,” said Rowett. “Games like this are hard when you are such a technical player like Zian. It can be frustrating when you don’t have much of the ball.

“He was a little bit like me at half-time, thinking we needed to get out more and we need to show a bit of composure on the ball.

“But at the end, he was like ‘look we took the three points, who cares how we do it? And we move on’. On another day that’s a 0-0 draw, and both teams are a bit frustrated, but because we scored the early goal, we had something to hold onto. We are very good when we have the bit between our teeth when it comes to defending and keeping a clean sheet. We’ve not had many clean sheets away from home, but that was an important one today.”

The Lions boss and club record signing Flemming were locked in conversation as they both headed down the tunnel at half-time during the victory over Alex Neil’s side.

Asked what the conversation was about, the Lions boss replied: “I was talking to him about the game and saying to him if we need to change it, this is what we will do, and then about 20 minutes into the second half, we did change it. So at least the players knew what we were going to change it for.

“He is such an intelligent player. You can tell him – and he gets it. He can action those instructions really well on the pitch. He was frustrated because we felt a bit passive in the first half, but that was just as much down to Stoke moving the ball well, rotating and moving but not quite having the edge in the final third.”

Before he joined the Lions, Rowett managed at Birmingham, Derby and Stoke, where he made some high-profile signings. He was asked if the signing of the Dutchman in the summer was his best regarding value for money as a manager.

“In terms of value for money, he would have to be right up there,” he said. “Certainly at Millwall, I’ve made some not-bad ones. People like Che Adams at Birmingham when I was there moved on for £16million or £17m pounds, so he did okay.

“Zian is a good player. He’s a very good player. For the price we paid for him, it’s a snip. He’s shown he’s got the character, he’s got the physicality, and that bit of game-changing quality that you saw today. I’m really pleased with him. He’s a team player, and that’s the best bit he doesn’t play like a selfish player, and that’s really important at a club like ours.”

Should Millwall carry on with their current trajectory, they will likely finish the season in the Championship’s top six, meaning they will get a shot at the league’s end-of-season lottery for a place in the Premier League.

Rowett reckons Flemming will find himself in England’s elite division, regardless of whether the Lions make it there or not.

“He’s the sort of player I’d expect to see there. We are working very hard to see if he can get there with us, but either way, I think he has got the quality to get there,” Rowett added.