Is Rotherham United's 2-1 victory over Reading a sign they are starting to win mind games too? The final word

But manager Steve Evans playing psychologist and Sam Nombe scoring could be a starting point for overdue progress. Could be.

It was about more than beating Reading 2-1.

For starters, when the Royals winged it into a 1-0 lead, their hosts looked mentally vulnerable.

Rotherham were in control until former Middlesbrough and Sheffield Wednesday midfielder Lewis Wing curled Reading's first shot over a five-man defensive wall and into the net from a 26th-minute free-kick. Confidence seemed to flow by osmosis from one team to the other.

To turn it around was a big deal. They ought not to but could well have ended up back where they started, but for Cameron Dawson's save from Cameron Humphreys in the seventh added minute.

But it was more than that too.

Having won away for the first time in 693 days at Cambridge United on Tuesday, Rotherham now have back-to-back victories for the first time in 718.

These milestones should be easier to chalk off one division down at a level the Millers have been experts in over their last four seasons there. But life does not work like that.

You might think the hangover that comes when a team gets used to losing, as the Millers did 51 times over the last two seasons, would have been shifted by a summer overhaul.

"Every season brings its own challenges and it's been a big turnover of players so I don't think you can really put it down to mental baggage," argued Hakeem Odoffin. But life does not work like that either.

The all-engulfing fog of defeatism is not just about the 11 on the field but those in the stands, those too disheartened to join them, and even those in a town as attached to its football club as Rotherham.

"Before I got chance to speak some boys mentioned the response of the supporters, a little bit of booing, and I said that's not based on the first-half performance, we played really well in spells," said Evans, glossing over how they lost their way at 0-1.

"I said that's two years of frustration so don't take that personally.

"I said, 'We need to put the Christmas tree lights up in October.' How do we do that? We play as we played, we get a little bit more width in our play, we have more movement, more aggression and I said we'd run over them. We did that."

They could consider themselves unlucky to go behind, Mallik Wilks tracking back but from the wrong angle when Wing kicked through him to win a free-kick few others in the division would have converted.

"When I was here for three-and-a-half years (2012-2015) we could go a goal down," reasoned Evans. "They'd go for a pie and when they came back we'd be 3-1 up. We were that type of team. Supporters believed we would come back and score.

"Those supporters have watched defeat after defeat for the best part of two years. When their team went a goal down, they'd think: 'Here we go.' This stadium would be emptying on 65, 70 minutes if Rotherham were a goal down."

Joe Powell's whipped cross and Nombe's run and near-post finish after 50 minutes and changed the New York's state of mind.

Joe Rafferty's centre from the other side was looped for 6ft 3in Odoffin to jump highest to minutes later.

"I said at half-time when they hang it up I'm able to make that late run," revealed the midfielder.

Rotherham ought to have put the game to bed but for wastefulness and David Button brilliantly denying Nombe a third goal in a week – he scored the only one at Cambridge.

When Kelvin Ehibhatiomhan was sent off after 69 minutes for some push and shove with Rafferty that Andre Garcia looked more guilty of, Reading left themselves wide open. Poor choices and poor execution – substitute Jack Holmes had two late chances – were almost punished by a Humphreys own goal.

It would have been typical Rotherham. Evans is here to change that.

"Those days can never come back to New York. Never," he insisted. "When you're thinking 'If we lose the first goal we'll get beaten by four', it's pretty hard to keep turning up.

"We'll lose games at New York because it's a tough division, but it should never be through a lack of fight. Maybe that was forgotten at times."

So was this the week the mindset changed?

"We'll find out, won't we?"

Rotherham United: Dawson; Rafferty, Humphreys, McCart, James (Bramall 65); Tiehi (McWilliams 82), Odoffin (MacDonald 88), Powell; Wilks (Holmes 88); Clarke-Harris (Hugill 82), Nombe. Unused substitutes: Hungbo, Phillips.

Reading: Button; Craig (Dean 90), Mbengue, Bindon, Abrefa (Garcia 28 (Akande 90)); Wing; Campbell (Wareham 72), Elliott (Savage 72), Knibbs, Ehibhatiomhan; Smith. Unused substitutes: Rowley, Tuma.

Referee: B Toner (Blackburn).