Paul Warne post Burton Albion...
Interim manager Paul Warne hailed his side for another committed performance despite a narrow 2-1 home defeat to Burton Albion.
The Millers paid for a poor five minute spell in the first half where goals from Chris O’Grady and Jackson Irvine put Nigel Clough’s Burton in a commanding position.
Warne’s side fought back to snatch a goal just before the break through Tom Adeyemi, but despite having all of the play in the second half, they couldn’t break down a resolute Burton rearguard.
A philosophical and upbeat Warne was again impressed with the performance and endeavour from his side, whilst acknowledging mistakes were made for the Burton goals.
“I thought we were good today, very good in the first half and I think we deserved to go one up,” he said after the game.
“I thought we played really well and there was obviously a mistake for the first goal where we backed off a little bit and Pricey, whose been brilliant for me, maybe should have kept hold of it.
“I'm perhaps being a bit harsh and I'm not going to pull him out for it because he's been brilliant for me. Unfortunately, it fell to their lad and they scored another one straight after, but I didn't think we deserved that.
“We are trying to build on them psychologically and they're still a little bit fragile but I thought they gave their job lot. They scored just before half-time and if it was a boxing fight I thought at half time we were going to win it, but football is not like that and you need that little bit of luck and the ball to drop at the right time.
“We threw the kitchen sink at it in the second half and we had a lot of possession, which in this league we're not renowned for having. We did have a lot of it and I thought we passed the ball well but we didn't really have that cutting edge to equalise in the second half."
Warne left no stone unturned in his quest for a breakthrough, throwing on the likes of Peter Odemwingie, Greg Halford and Dexter Blackstock as they looked to make the vital breakthrough.
In the second half the home side had the majority of the ball, and switched to a more attacking system, with Warne admitting he had ‘no regrets’ after throwing everything into the mix after the interval.
“I made changes and none of the lads that I took off were having bad games, I just wanted to freshen it up and change it to something different,” he added.
“We changed the system twice and unfortunately it still wasn't enough but I have no regrets with what I did tonight. I said to the lads, I'm proud of what they tried to achieve but unfortunately the result wasn't there and it's a results business and it's disappointing that we came away with a defeat.
“You can't relive moments like that. There are big moments in big games and players either take them or they don't. Tonight we didn't take them. We've got people trying to score goals and people trying to do the right things on the ball and give people confidence but unfortunately tonight we didn't take the chances we possibly could have on another day.”
Warne says he won’t dwell on the defeat with a Yorkshire derby with Leeds on the horizon. He now has the task of picking up his troops ahead of the trip to Elland Road.
“We can't beat ourselves up over that,” he concluded.
“We've got to pick ourselves up again because we've got another game in three or four days.
“I think they have belief amongst themselves. If I had played in that game and we'd gone 2-0 down I would wilt a little bit because I'd be thinking, 'how much better do I have to play to score a goal'.
“We'll watch the video again tomorrow and look at the good bits and the bad bits, but I said the good bits will easily outnumber the bad bits.
“Nobody can say the lads gave up and I said to them at half time, don't go home and look in the rear view mirror and think I could have done a little bit more.”