Rotherham United v Charlton Athletic: Steve Evans on mood shift among Millers fans and why the dream is not yet over

His mid-table Rotherham United side are now closer to the top six than the bottom four – just about - and his football antennae knows full well that crazy things can happen in the final third of seasons.

After a forgettable first half of 2024-25, the Millers are finally - finally - showing signs of going the right way and the upturn in mood has been detected by Evans. A five-match unbeaten sequence in all competitions has been noteworthy for the level of opponents who Rotherham have faced at league level in particular. All were in the promotion picture to varying degrees when they faced them. They play another aspirant in Charlton on Saturday.

"I don’t look at tables really,” said Evans, pictured, whose side are also two wins from Wembley after Tuesday’s EFL Trophy success on penalties at Chesterfield in front of 1,000 travelling fans.

"Beating Charlton will be tough. But we have to say that beyond Charlton, there’s a run of fixtures that I, as a manager, will be demanding of my players that we get some points in.

"We need the type of backing we had at Chesterfield home and away.

"We won’t win every game, we will lose games and we won’t play as well as we have done in the past few games, but with the Millers fans - in my first three-and-a-half years here - sometimes we didn’t play well, but they were with us every step of the way.

"I have seen a marked difference since we came out of Lincoln.

"I go around the town and stay in the town some nights. I go for a beer and to the supermarket and I have seen a marked difference in how our supporters are looking at the football club, even from eight weeks ago. The one thing that will never stop us is investment, budget or resources. Matt Taylor and Leam Richardson (previous managers) were two good guys, but it was never hamstrung by budgets.

"People can hide behind that, I don’t hide behind that. I have never hidden behind the fact that our budget is competitive."

With results on the mend, the next mission for the Millers in their campaign is to sign off a statement week.

A home victory following on from Trophy progress at Chesterfield and an excellent win over Bolton at the AESSEAL New York Stadium seven days ago would certainly rubber-stamp that.

Evans continued: "It’s a big seven days. We’ve dealt with two in front of us, but arguably Charlton will be the toughest of them all when we look at the quality of player and expenditure and the demands of Nathan Jones and they have spent big.

"But Nathan has spent well and it’s not a case of the manager not spending well. Plus they are in terrific form.

"If you get Charlton on a bandwagon and roll, it’s a bit like us, we are hard to stop. I think we couldn't have dreamt six weeks ago of going to Chesterfield and making seven changes and being highly in the game and bringing on the class of player we did.”