ALEX Neil said Millwall’s new signings are growing more familiar with the club’s style of play.
The Lions rounded off their preparations for the new Championship campaign with a 1-0 win over Royal Antwerp on Saturday, their best performance of the pre-season. Before that, they had beaten CD Eldense, drawn with Bromley and lost to FC Andorra, Gillingham and Stevenage.
All seven of Millwall’s summer signings have featured during the club’s warm-up fixtures. Jenson Metcalfe started against Antwerp, while Mark Sykes, Elkan Baggott, Tairyk Arconte and Kyrell Lisbie came off the bench. Mathis Servais missed out with a hamstring injury, while Danny Batth was an unused substitute.
After the victory over the Belgian side, Neil was asked whether he had seen improvement from game to game ahead of Millwall’s first game of the season, an EFL Cup tie at Queens Park Rangers on August 8.
“Yes,” Neil said. “You can see we’re moving the ball quicker. The understanding for the new lads is becoming better and better. That’s naturally going to take a little bit of time.
“If you’ve got a team and you introduce maybe one or two, it’s easy to get them up to speed quickly. When you’re trying to introduce five or six, that’s when it starts to dilute the message a little bit because not only do they not fully understand it, but the one next to them might not understand it either.
“Having Jenson in there, for instance, with Casper [De Norre] and with Camiel [Neghli], that’s brilliant for him because he’s got guys around him who know how we play, know how we press, know what it should look like, and he’ll take a lot from today. I was really pleased with him.”
