Today, I made the 10 hour-round trip down to The Den to watch Hull take a point from Millwall. Given the reputation of the club, I smartly brought a water pistol just in case anyone tried it on with me. It is safe to say, luckily for them, I did not have to use it and went home unscathed.
This game was a frustrating game to watch and I am beginning to see a pattern emerge with how we play our matches; we have a good spell for a section of a half and then allow the rest of the minutes to the opposition, where they always take advantage and score. Just like today, we came back from one nil behind to bring it to 2-1, then instead of battling for more, we sat back for the next half and gave them too many opportunities; inevitably, they scored. After being thrashed on Tuesday night, I was ready for them to bounce back, but we seem to have lost our momentum slightly.
Liam Rosenior made two changes to the starting eleven: Scott Twine came in for Aaron Connolly and Sean McLoughlin replaced Lewie Coyle, who picked up another injury at Portman Road on Tuesday night. That meant our team was as follows: Ryan Allsop, in goal; Sean McLoughlin, Alfie Jones, Jacob Greaves and Cyrus Christie as the back line; Tyler Morton, Jean Seri and Jaden Philogene anchoring the middle and that leaves Liam Delap, Scott Twine and Adama Traore as the attacking trio.
Similar to Tuesday, The Tigers fell behind just seven minutes after the whistle was blown; Millwall were awarded a free-kick on the left in a good position and they swooped it into the box. After it travelled through our defence, it landed into the path of Duncan Watmore, who put it in. I don’t know how this even went in the net; first, the defence should have dealt with it and, second, Ryan Allsop should have kept it out. It was literally struck at him and he managed to handle it into his own net. Very disappointing, but all forgiven over the next 30 minutes.
Our equaliser came in the 25th minute Sean Mcloughlin smartly put the ball over the top, which landed in Philogene’s feet, who neatly controlled it, ran to the goal and stuck it in the net. This was a brilliant response, but we were not done. Just five minutes later, we took the lead; a pass back to the Millwall keeper at the back went wrong and Philogene was quick to react and pick up the loose ball. He quickly turned whilst the goal was open, teed up Traore, who smashed it in the net. That is what you call a response and I struggle to figure out why we cannot do this in every game we concede. Nevertheless, we headed into the half as the better side.
The second period belonged to the hosts and we could not find the same momentum we had in the first 45 minutes. Again, it did not take them long to get their equaliser; in the 53rd minute, Bryan showed some great composure to cut inside a marker and send a low ball past Allsop, which fizzled into the back of the net.
For the remainder of the half, we were outplayed yet again and any hope of taking home all three points disappeared as the clock crept towards 90 minutes. We could have even conceded towards the latter stages; the two substitutes for The Lions combined as Romaine Esse put Aidomo Emakhu through, but he thrashed his effort into the top tier of the opposite stand to us.
At least it was not another loss on the road and I was able to write this before we got out of London! It was, however, another galling performance and I believe it is down to the lack of options we have. We are without key players in every position, which are missing pieces to the puzzle, such as: Ozan Tufan, Regan Slater, Lewie Coyle and Harry Vaughan. Our midfield is all over the place and we need these options to strengthen our team.
I am glad that I made the trip down as it was another ground to tick off and I always love going to London, which was probably the highlight of the day; coming into London and seeing the picturesque skyline and also leaving, which took us over the Tower Bridge and into the heart of the capital. We now have an international break, but after that we face Southampton under the lights of the MKM Stadium. Most of the players should be back by then and hopefully we can get back on track.