Saved the worst till last

We've sort of got used to disappointments on our travels this season, only three wins, the last back in early November, and not a single goal to celebrate on our travels since Michael Ricketts gave us a 1-0 lead at Ipswich ten weeks ago, but it has never been this bad.

The whole afternoon was played in a somewhat strange atmosphere, despite the official attendance I don't think there were much over 4,000 inside the Den and the home fans, clearly not happy, were displaying banners, one of which read, “Lions Bled by Donkeys”. They had their Player of the Year presentations before kick off and the winner of the top award, David Livermore, was booed by the home supporters.

To the game and Steve Cotterill made one change to the side, Ricketts replacing the injured Chris McCann, and that meant Graham Branch reverting to a position on the left hand side of midfield. This was our last chance to find that elusive fourth away win but by five past three you knew it just wasn't going to happen.

By then we'd needlessly given the ball away a few times and had presented Millwall with what proved to be the easiest chance of the game that they someone missed with a shot that went way over the top of the bar.

We'd given the ball away from a free kick and even before they crossed the half way line on their right wing you knew they were going to get a shot in, we seemed incapable and unwilling to do anything about it.

We had our best spell of the game then, and without really threatening the home goal we did mount some attacks down the far end and did get in a couple of shots on goal, but if anyone was going to score then it was the home side.

The fact that they didn't was due to the fact that our central defenders performed competently amidst the shambles and were able to deal with things, and that continued despite losing John McGreal to what looked like a back injury. He was replaced by John Spicer who went to right back with Frank Sinclair moving into the centre.

We held on to 0-0, that was until stoppage time at the end of the first half when the home side were finally presented with the simplest of opening goals. Some fans at half time were criticising goalkeeper Brian Jensen for his part in it, but for me this one was 100% down to James O'Connor. Jensen might well have come running out too far but the header back from the midfielder was ridiculous and gave no one a chance.

A goal down at half time, we could hardly complain even though the opposition played like a side bad enough to have been relegated, surely it couldn't be as bad in the second half.

I'm afraid to report that it was, there was no obvious improvement, the only difference being that Millwall actually got worse. That left us treated to as bad a 45 minutes football as you are likely to see at this level.

We made a change, Wade Elliott came on for Ricketts, and given the loan striker's performance it was impossible for that change to make things worse. It's sometimes unfair to criticise individuals but there will be no feeling of loss when this particular player heads back to Leeds in just over a week.

Elliott struggled down the right hand side, but it is difficult enough coming on at that stage of a game, even when the side is playing reasonably well.

Coming on during this performance must have been like mission impossible.

We didn't have a goal in us, we didn't appear to have a shot at goal in us, but if referee Penton had done his job then we could well have equalised in the closing stages. In a rare excursion into the Millwall penalty area Andy Gray near as damn it had his shirt ripped off his back.

There really could be no option, it was as clear a penalty as you are ever likely to see – but our one and only, and I really mean our one and only, chance of getting back into the game had been snatched from us.

Incredibly we did get an effort on target shortly afterwards, a downward header from Micah Hyde, but it went straight to goalkeeper Colin Doyle without causing him any problems whatsoever.

We sat there just waiting for it to end and eventually it did. There was a stunned silence from the away end, I don't think anyone could believe it was ever likely to be this bad. It was I'm afraid, and I for one am thankful there will be a good few weeks rest before I have to set my alarm on a Saturday morning to travel to an away game, and when I do I sincerely hope it will be considerably better than this apology for a performance.

The teams were,

Millwall: Colin Doyle, Mark Phillips, Paul Robinson, Zak Whitbread (Dean Pooley 60), Tony Craig, Barry Cogan, Marvin Elliott, Will Hendry, Ben Williams (Trevor Robinson), Ben May, Berry Powel (Carlos Fangueiro 81), Ben Williams. Subs: Alan Brooks, Curtis Weston.

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Frank Sinclair, Michael Duff, John McGreal (John Spicer 38), Jon Harley, Alan Mahon, James O'Connor, Micah Hyde, Graham Branch, Michael Ricketts (Wade Elliott 63), Andy Gray. Subs not used: Garreth O'Connor, Danny Karbassiyoon, Kyle Lafferty.

Referee: Clive Penton (Sussex).

Attendance: 7,780.