Rotherham United v Reading - The magic number Paul Warne hopes will see Millers avoid relegation trapdoor

The Millers were relegated from the second-tier in 2018-19 with 40 points, when 45 would have been enough to keep them in the division.

Last season, Charlton Athletic finished in 22nd with 48 points but Warne feels the threshold for safety will be even higher this term. The Millers are in the relegation places on 29 points but do have two games in hand over the three sides immediately above them.

“I think you are going to need at least 50 points this year,” said Warne.

“There are plenty of teams fighting away. If you said to me now that we get 54 points, I would think that would be enough.

“Anything below that is going to be very close to the trapdoor.”

With some sides starting to pull away from the bottom three, Warne feels that there will be four or five teams in the equation for survival come the final weeks of the season.

He continued: “I can see a couple of the teams pulling away. I did say a few weeks ago that I didn’t envisage Derby or Nottingham Forest being involved.

“There are teams involved now who didn’t seem like they would be a few weeks ago.

“There are five or six teams now who are competing. With there being so many games, if you get back-to-back positive results you could pull away in the same way that back-to-back defeats can suck you back in.

“I would think come the last few weeks, it will be between four and five teams. But I am never right so that means there could be 18 teams!”

Rotherham host fifth-placed Reading this afternoon and Warne feels that the Royals’ pace could cause his side problems.

He added: “They are really good with the ball. They move it really well and have got unbelievable athletes.

“They have got some pace in the team, their movement in midfield is really difficult to address.

“The key to this game is to match their athleticism and movement and move the ball quickly before they get the banks up which are hard to break down.

“They do score goals from counter-attacks because of the pace in the team.”

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