Gary Rowett on Ryan Leonard gamble and professionalism of his side
Gary Rowett admitted he took a gamble playing Ryan Leonard at centre-back against Huddersfield.
It was the first time that Leonard started in the role as the Lions came away from the John Smith’s Stadium with all three points for the first time since 2009.
“I took a bit of a gamble by playing Ryan Leonard at right centre-back, said Rowett.
“I just felt we needed to be really mobile in those three areas. I think Pearcey has been incredible for us as a leader but I just felt to ask him to go again today would be really difficult, giving him a breather I think helped. Asking the likes of Thommo to come in and do the shift he did was fabulous and again I was really, really, pleased with the way the game plan worked.
“To limit a team that have got as a good a home record as anyone in the division I think they had one shot on target and if I’m being really honest I don’t think they really hurt us apart from the penalty where we got it wrong. Danny jumps out too early, they play round him and then Thommo lets a runner go and he gets the wrong side I can have a debate whether I really think that’s a penalty, but when he gets the wrong side I think it’s an easy decision for the ref to make.
The Lions had a second goal rule out in the second half.
“I thought we were unfortunate not to go 2-0 up. We get a little meley, the keeper falls on Coops, we score and Coops gets penalised for being offside, I don’t see what else have can do there but again it’s a clean sheet, it’s a great mentality, it’s big result in a run of games where we know we haven’t done that often enough.
Rowett was  full of praise for Leonard.
“I spoke about six weeks ago about Ryan Leonard being a managers type of player, you know wherever he goes he is going to do the job as well as he can, and I thought he settled into the role really well.
The Millwall chief also spoke about the mentality his side need to have before games especially on the day of the game itself.
‘We did a lot of work yesterday, I think there was a different focus about the group I spoke to them about it. I spoke to them about it being game day and us needing to be a bit more focussed, we need to have a little bit more determination within ourselves during the day to make sure we do what we need to do in the game. I felt when we turned up at Forest we were a little bit too relaxed for my liking and I felt tonight we were far more professional and far more committed and now it’s easy to do one game we need to do it two games, three games, four games, five games, thats the challenge.”