Millers lose at Don Valley

As Darlington kept pace with the leaders of League Two the Millers slipped to their second defeat at Don Valley.

On a bitterly cold night, the home side came out the quicker with Alex Rhodes having the first shot in the opening minutes which was easily caught by ‘keeper Simon Brown. Both Pablo Mills and Danny Harrison had half hearted shots towards goal before Mills kicked the ball into the crowded penalty area for Mark Burchill whose shot went just wide of Browns goal. Dale Tonge had an effort that went high over the bar and Micky Cummins had a shot that went straight into Browns’ arms. But Darlington defended well and also had chances on the break, one from Jason Kennedy that was blocked by a defender. Franz Burgmeier had a shot that went wide of Andy Warrington’s goal and a Neil Austin free kick went just over the bar. Darlington should have gone into the lead when Liam Hatch hit a powerful shot from twenty-five yards out that beat Warrington but smashed against the post and went out for a goal kick.

Like the first half, the Millers came out the better side for the start of the second half with both Burchll and Harrison seeing efforts go wide. But some of the home sides passing was woeful and many of the high balls into the air didn’t find a Millers head. On the sixty-first minute, Ricky Ravenhill jumped on a ball that wasn’t cleared by the Millers defence and hit the ball into the back of the net, beating Warrington on the way. The Millers seemed at sixes and sevens for a while and it wasn’t until the final ten minutes that they started to push forward when an outswinging Mark Hudson corner was punched away by Brown. In time added on, a twenty-five yard shot from Danny Harrison was blocked by Stephen Foster and a Mickey Cummins shot was parried to safety by Brown. In the dying minutes Brown brought off a wonderful save to stop the Millers from scoring and Hudson had a shot saved off the line by Neil Austin.

A poor performance tonight from Mark Robins’ men. The Millers have to get back to winning ways on Saturday to keep moving up the table.