GARY Rowett wants Ben Thompson in his squad for the rest of the season – and said Millwall have brought forward their search for a centre-back one transfer window.
Thompson was linked with a move to Portsmouth in the last window and there was more speculation he could depart Millwall in January after he hadn’t started in the league since December 5.
But Thompson came off the bench to score against Nottingham Forest last weekend and started in the 1-0 win at Huddersfield on Wednesday night.
Rowett knows Thompson is not satisfied with a fringe role.
“Thommo’s the sort of lad that he desperately wants to play,” Rowett said. “He’s like Danny Mac, he’s Millwall through-and-through and it hurts him seeing the team not perform as well as we would all like.
“What I like about Thommo, particularly Saturday [at Forest], he comes on and shows a little bit of fire and a little bit of fight.
“At this moment in time he’s going to get opportunities and then it will be up to him.
“He’s one that ideally we want to keep around. I’m also aware that if players are not playing they want to play, that’s what it should be like for a footballer.
“Thommo’s one that I’m sure will get opportunities.”
Rowett wants to add a defender in this window as Murray Wallace is out with a broken foot.
Rowett said: “Muzza’s injury leaves us a bit bare, particularly if we want to play a back three. When we want to play a back three it’s difficult with the amount of games that we’ve got for that three to just keep churning out performances.
“So what that’s done now is accelerated the need for another defender. That’s something that we’re looking at.
“We were probably looking at it long-term anyway but maybe now we just bring that search forward to this window rather than the next window.”
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