Millwall’s defensive displays please Gary Rowett after another clean sheet collected at Reading

Gary Rowett reckons that Millwall’s defence is starting to look a lot more solid after another shutout in their 1-0 win against Reading.

The Lions have kept five clean sheets in the last eight Championship games.

Jake Cooper’s goal in Berkshire made it five straight victories.

Rowett told the South London Press: “That’s been really important for us [clean sheets], we spoke about that before. Again, if you don’t score lots and lots of goals, then you have to make sure you’re defensively solid.

“We have looked a lot better defensively in the last period of games, and that’s sometimes my fault because in the early part of the season, people talking about more goals, we talked about more goals.

“We talked about taking more risks and being a little bit more open and the flip side to that, of course, is that sometimes there’s a little more space on the pitch which other teams can exploit.

“We’ve got the balance right at the moment and I’m certainly much more pleased with our performances defensively than I was previously.”

Daniel Ballard made his first start since returning from knee surgery with Benik Afobe, previously ruled out with a hamstring strain, also getting action.

Rowett added: “If we lose Hutchy, someone like Dan Ballard coming back in was massive today.

“We lost Mason Bennett and Benik comes back in. It felt a little bit like for like and it wasn’t a massive issue for us.

“It made the bench a little bit lighter but certainly it was good timing for those players to get back on their pitch and perform well.”