How Rotherham United can use Wembley win as springboard to win League One title

Few competitions suffer as much derision as the Football League Trophy but as he puffed out his chest to reveal his winner’s medal, Michael Ihiekwe argued the victory could only do Rotherham United’s promotion hopes good.

One win in their last five league matches had whittled away the Millers’ lead at the top of League One, to the point where they kicked off at Wembley on Saturday only ahead of Wigan Athletic on goal difference and third-placed Milton Keynes Dons by a point. Wigan have a game in hand on Rotherham, who have one on Milton Keynes.

So the Millers needed a bit of a shot in the arm and although they made hard work of it, beating League Two Sutton United 4-2 after extra-time in the Papa John’s Trophy final at Wembley provided it, especially for Ihiekwe, who headed in the fourth goal.

“It’s Wembley, isn’t it? It doesn’t matter what competition you play in, it’s at Wembley,” said the centre-back, who hit a post shortly before heading in a Shane Ferguson corner.

“All your family’s there, all the fans have travelled and I don’t care what competition you’ve played in, not many people can say they’ve won at Wembley.”

To have a change of scenery from the slog of a hard-fought promotion race was important toio, Ihiekwe felt. When Charlton Athletic visit the AESSEAL New York Stadium on Saturday it will be Rotherham’s first league match for three weeks which have also included an international break.

“We’re a smallish squad compared to some teams in the league and that comes with negatives and benefits of course,” said Iheikwe.

“We hadn’t really had a blip all season but we’ve had one now and that break should serve us well. It’s just a massive push now for a month.

“I think we were a little bit rusty (at Wembley) but I wouldn’t blame it on the few weeks we haven’t played.

“I think the break’s done us well and then to play in this competition and win should give us the confidence now, it’s a brilliant platform so let’s go and get promoted.

“Success breeds success so to go there and win was an amazing day for us and our families; now let’s have another amazing day by getting promoted and enjoying it with the fans.”

Manager Paul Warne’s main concern was not allowing any negativity to creep in, as it might have done had substitute Jordi Osei-Tutu not equalised in the sixth added minute of stoppage time to take the game into an additional 30 minutes.

“If you speak to any of my staff all I’ve been saying is I wanted to win a trophy more for anyone who doubts this team,” he said.

“I don’t want people turning up to the Charlton game thinking, ‘Oh my God, we’ve lost to Sutton last week, they don’t know what they’re doing.’

“I wanted to turn up for the Charlton game really proud of what the team had achieved because we’ve got seven massive games.

“I wanted to win the trophy, don’t get me wrong, but it was more about the fact I wanted the positivity of the trophy to help us in the last seven games.

“If it had gone the other way, it could have had a detrimental effect, I’m well aware of that.”