Evans dismisses idea of comfortable repeat

They have, after all, already beaten the Shots 3-0 at the Recreation Ground this season, and while it may not have been the most glamorous of third-round ties, it is one that presents the Millers with a good chance of progressing to the fourth round.

Aldershot have won just twice at home this season in the League while the Millers are playing some of their best stuff on the road, with wins in all of their last five games.

All of which should add up to a comfortable passage for the Millers, who knocked out Stevenage and Notts County in the earlier rounds – two sides with designs on playing in the Championship next season.

Yet manager Steve Evans is wary of the threat posed by a side struggling at the wrong end of the Football League.

“I’d rather be going there having won 3-0 than having lost 3-0, but we can banish any thoughts that it will be as comfortable as it was then because Dean Holdsworth (the manager) has certainly turned it around,” said Evans.

That 3-0 win by the Millers made it seven straight defeats for the Shots, but since then they have lost just three of 14 games.

Rotherham have not been in the fourth round of the FA Cup since 2002, and have made a habit in the past of losing to teams they were expected to beat.

Forest Green and Mansfield defeated them at their old Millmoor ground, as did Northampton Town in a 2004 replay when a glamorous fourth-round date with Manchester United beckoned for Ronnie Moore’s then-Championship side.

Even though winning promotion from League Two is the priority, a good Cup remains important to Evans, who in the last two years reached the fifth round with Crawley Town.

“I know how much of an effect it can have on the league form,” he said.

“It can give everyone around the place a lift.”

Rotherham have bolstered their resources this week with the loan acquisition of Liverpool’s 18-year-old striker Adam Morgan and by securing a permanent deal for Lee Frecklington.