JOE Edwards said Millwall’s 1-1 draw with Huddersfield feels like a defeat after the dramatic ending to the game.
The Lions took the lead early in the second half after Brooke Norton-Cuffy forced the ball home after 57 minutes.
But the Terriers were given a penalty for a George Saville hand ball deep in stoppage time, allowing Delano Burgzorg to strike home a spot-kick and give the visitors a point.
Millwall and Huddersfield were both on the same amount of points before kick-off and sitting just a point clear of the bottom three.
Reacting to the game, head coach Edwards said: “Obviously we’re gutted with the finish to the game and in all honestly it’s one of those that feels like a defeat.
“We knew the importance of today’s game. Without overplaying it, we know that when you’re in a bad run like we are when you do get a fixture when you’re at home against a team that’s below you in the table, it’s one where you really want to go out and win it.
“We had every intention of doing that. We knew with the form and the run we’re in, it wouldn’t necessarily be the most attractive performance and it didn’t need to be. It was more about spirit and getting the job done.
“I think the game played out like that. I thought the first half was edgy, there wasn’t much in it, we didn’t play well. But we came in at half-time agreeing that we knew that’s what it was going to be, could we up it and go again and I think we did to be fair to the lads. I think we came out in the second half and we were better, a bit sharper.
“We get the goal and as with us at the moment it seems to be a recurring thing where when you get the first breakthrough, it then lifts confidence and we looked better after the goal. A bit more belief in what we doing with our passing and when we were breaking away on them and looked we could have got the second.
“But as we know in football whenever that scoreline is 1-0, you’re at risk particularly when you’re in this run we’re in and to lose it like that, with an unnecessary set-piece down in the corner and then a deflection into someone’s hand… it feels like, without feeling sorry for ourselves, it feels like that’s how things are going for us at the moment.
“We’ve conceded goals at Leicester at Ipswich where we have six bodies in front of the ball and it’s deflected or going through into our net. Ball goes into our box [today] and that happens and it’s incredibly frustrating. Because I thought, in what was probably a poor game, we were the better team that looked like the home team going to try and win it and I thought we deserved to in general. And it feels like two points dropped for sure.”
On the penalty incident, which saw Huddersfield substitute Josh Koroma hit a shot back into the Millwall box which hit Saville’s hand, Edwards said: “I can see why it’s been given and I think it always will.
“We don’t have VAR but even if we did, it probably still would be. I haven’t spoke to Sav so whether he would deliberately intend to save the ball with his hand I don’t know, but the hand is in a position and it hits it. It’s probably one of those reflexes – when it happens that quick, Sav’s not made a decision to do it.
“When we’re in these moments where we feel like things go against you, it was going to go against us.
“It’s disappointing. It feels like we do a lot of real, hard work and we’re well-organised in the main defensively but little lapses and mistakes are happening probably a little bit too often and we’re getting punished for them at the moment, we really are.”
Edwards believes it is not work rate or application that’s the issues but more confidence and a lack of clinical finishing in front of goal.
He said: “I’ve been reflecting on the best hour of football and performance since I’ve been here which was Sheffield Wednesday, the final hour of the day. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I’m seeing it as a trait of our team at the moment. It was tough up there for 20 minutes, it was edgy, we got the first goal and it lifted us a bit. When we then got the second goal, there was belief, there was a flow about our football and the passing was clean and there was a clear confidence. And we haven’t had that luxury of many other games when I’ve been here where we get a goal or a second and there’s just a bit of edginess about our play at the moment.
“It’s definitely not an attitude or work rate thing, it’s not for the want of trying. But we just can’t find that clinical nature to put games.”