NEIL Harris has paid tribute to his Millwall managerial predecessors as he explained how he has engineered back-to-back wins.
Wins against Southampton and Watford have allowed the Lions to keep their heads above water amid a frantic battle to avoid the drop in the Championship.
Harris was brought in last month after an alarming run of form under Joe Edwards and has instantly managed to deliver big results. The Lions boss also enjoyed success during his previous four-and-a-half year spell in charge at The Den between 2015 and 2019.
The 46-year-old boss was asked after the game how he has managed to have such a big impact.
He told reporters: “I’m just following on from two very good football people in Gary [Rowett] and Joe. And you get a job because someone leaves – ie like how I left Cambridge – or you get a job because something’s not quite right at football clubs.
“It’s not for me to judge what’s not quite right at a football club. All I can do is try to galvanise the football club. I done it as a player, many-a-time, on the pitch and off the pitch. I’ve done it as a leader of the football club as a manager in a four-and-a-half year stint and I know what it takes to do it. I know what it takes to put the Millwall-ness back into it.
“There’s no guarantees we’re going to come above that dotted line just because I’m in the building. I can galvanise, I can ask the fans to support the team, I can organise the players and try and help them along the way. But they have do it on the pitch and they’ve taken care of that two games in a row.
“All I’ve done is come in and been myself. Big personality, big character, smile on my face. I have loads and loads of energy at the moment, I love this football club. I think there’s nine players in the changing room I gave Millwall debuts to and they had a smile on their face when I walked in the building.
“When I’m bouncing around the place and I’m very loud and other lads that maybe haven’t quite worked with characters like me before in the game are staring at me, then people like George Saville and Jake Cooper know how to help those players understand what I want.
“That’s what we are. We have to be that big boy in the football club because that’s what we’ve always been. Sometimes you just need a leader that knows what it looks like and how to get it out of the players.”