Rotherham United manager Paul Warne assessed his side’s display after a fine 3-2 win this afternoon. The Millers made it five home league wins on the spin as Burton Albion were the latest victims at AESSEAL New York Stadium.
“I can come up with all sorts of clichés about how good teams win when they play poorly, but I didn’t think we were very good today,” said Warne.
“We looked jaded. It’s on me, I probably should have made changes but they were so good Tuesday night. It’s difficult to change after a great performance. We just looked a bit emotionally drained, I think. I wasn’t best pleased with it but to come out with three points is testament to the lads.
“He made some saves, as did theirs to be fair. We created enough opportunities to win the game today but we conceded enough opportunities to lose the game. If you’re a neutral you’d have loved it. On another day, we could have won comfortably or took a good beating. I’m pleased we’ve won when we’ve played bad and it’s always easy to learn after a victory.
“We need to freshen them up for next week because that level of performance won’t get us where we want to be.”
Michael Smith’s double sandwiched Jamie Murphy’s opener but the Brewers levelled through Oliver Sarkic. However, substitute Freddie Ladapo had the last say with a well-taken winner on his birthday.
“The birthday boy got the winning goal,” continued Warne. “I said to him before that that would happen. He’s the happiest lad in the dressing room. There is some tired legs, I think. Last week took a lot out of a couple of players and it’s been an emotional week for us all. It’s been exhausting and maybe I didn’t have my finger on the pulse as much as normal.
“I’ll take a bit of responsibility but I thought the fans stayed with the team really well today, which I really appreciate because if that had been earlier in the season when we’d performed like that it would have been a different sort of atmosphere.
“The lads gave everything, physically, but we weren’t at our sharp best today.
“We’ve got 15 games potentially left. It’s nice to be top of the league but there are a couple of teams with games in hand. All we can do is try win our games and have a level of performance which, at times, wasn’t there today.”