A freezing Villa Park was a skill tundra for the hosts, as the stunted creativity of Steve Bruce’s side made their promotion challenge shrivel a little. Millwall have not won away all campaign and were forced by Jordan Archer’s illness to start a debutant in goal, the 31-year-old David Martin making his first appearance for the club since joining as a free agent in the summer. Villa might have fancied testing the goalkeeper’s sharpness but failed to summon the wit to do so. They ended up grateful to their own goalkeeper, Sam Johnstone, for preserving a point in the face of an impressive performance by the visitors.
“Sometimes you have to take your hat off to the opposition,” said Bruce, who revealed that his team’s injury woes may have deepened here as Chris Samba and Henri Lansbury damaged hamstrings. “If you ever wanted to know how difficult the Championship is, you only have to look at Millwall. They were big, strong, physical, committed and they ran a million miles and caused us all sorts of problems. We’ll take the point and move forward because it could have been one of those horrible days when we lose. When your goalkeeper is your best player at home, it tells you we haven’t done enough.”
It was nearly half an hour before Villa hinted at troubling Martin but the goalkeeper was spared from having to exert himself thanks to a superb tackle by Jake Cooper, who slid in to block Keinan Davis’s shot. The striker had been presented with the chance by Robert Snodgrass, who had delivered the sort of pass that might have impressed even David Sullivan’s children.
The West Ham chairman told the Guardian this week that he bought Snodgrass in January against the advice of his sons but the Scot has generally done well for Villa since being farmed out on loan from the east London club.
This, however, was not one of his finest performances and he was replaced by Jack Grealish before the hour.
The best performers here were among the visitors. Neil Harris’s team coped admirably with the predictable threat mustered by Villa and were a constant nuisance on the counterattack. The only quibble was with their finishing.
Aiden O’Brien, dangerous throughout, created their first clear chance with a strong run followed by a cute pass to Jed Wallace, whose bursts from deep caused regular bother. Wallace had only the goalkeeper to beat but Johnstone saved. Wallace was given another chance four minutes later but Johnstone foiled him again.
Villa seemed sluggish as Millwall became bolder. Another run by O’Brien led to another opening for Wallace, who skipped around Johnstone and tried to pull the ball back to Lee Gregory only to be thwarted by Snodgrass.
A cutting retort eluded Villa. Instead they had to backpedal again just before the break, as another raid by O’Brien culminated in a shot from 15 yards by Steve Morison, which Johnstone saved.
Villa looked more zesty after the break but still lacked a cutting edge. Even after the introduction of Jack Grealish, Millwall were the first to bother the opposing goalkeeper, a rasping long-range shot by O’Brien drawing another save from Johnstone. Grealish replied in kind a couple of minutes later, registering Villa’s only shot on target.
Villa exerted more pressure in the final 20 minutes but Millwall absorbed it comfortably and came close to scoring when Morison released Gregory. The forward’s shot from 10 yards skimmed the crossbar. Soon Millwall were banging on Villa’s door again, Johnstone having to shoo them away twice more. The goalkeeper, at least, did not deserve the boos from the home crowd at the final whistle.
“There are not many teams who will come here and dominate like we did,” said Harris. “I’m delighted with the performance but we’re at the stage now where I can be a little critical and say we should have had more. If we want to become a top-half team, we need to win games like that.”
