GARY Rowett said Kenneth Zohore’s penalty changed the “psychology” of his side as they came from behind to beat Sheffield Wednesday 4-1 to earn their first home victory since October 20.
Rowett admitted to a feeling of deflation after Callum Paterson’s 10th-minute opener for the Owls with his side on an 11-games winless run at The Den.
But Zohore kept his calm to score from 12 yards, before two goals in two minutes from Scott Malone and substitute Ben Thompson made it 3-1 with 21 minutes left.
Another substitute, Tom Bradshaw, netted in the last minute as Millwall scored four goals in a game for the first time since their last match of last season against Huddersfield.
Rowett admitted he didn’t expect that deluge of goals after a poor first half from his side and their recent form on their home patch.
“I certainly haven’t seen it coming many times this season. It was a game that we had to make some changes to freshen it up, which was a little bit of a gamble,” Rowett said.
“Young Danny McNamara came out and I felt it was the right time for Mahlon [Romeo] to go back in and give us that little bit of an impact. Certainly Danny has done fabulously for us and he’ll play plenty more games.
“Thommo coming out was a difficult one. We changed shape slightly, I just felt there would be some opportunities to get into certain areas.
“But the first 30 minutes I was very disappointed with the performance. It was a tight game, there was nothing in it. Sheffield Wednesday were probably as attritional as us. They got the one break where we don’t defend well and we go 1-0 down.
“Our home form being as poor as it is this season you can’t help but feel a little bit deflated and disappointment with the start.
“We actually kicked on a little bit, we started to impose ourselves on the game for about 10 minutes before the penalty.
“The penalty for me changed our whole psychology, it changed the way everybody felt about the game and from then on in I felt we were completely dominant in terms of attacking moments.
“I think we had 24, 25 shots to their four, they didn’t really cause us any threat at all apart from the odd [Barry] Bannan delivery, his deliveries from free-kicks are fantastic.
“It was about taking chances. Second half we had to make more changes through injury, Maikel Kieftenbeld came off with his hamstring tight and Lenny [Ryan Leonard] had to come off with an ankle problem.
“[Keiren] Westwood makes three brilliant saves early on in the second half and you wonder what we’re going to do to score that second goal.
“It’s a moment of brilliance that gets it for us. Scottie Malone has been fantastic for us, it was a fabulous goal. Great individual goal.
“From then it was how many could we score. Thommo I’m sure will say he meant it, I haven’t spoken to him, it’s a brilliant strike.
“And then it just opened up. We kept our foot on the gas which is something we haven’t done enough this season.
“So I’m really pleased with the performance.”
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