Tottenham outstanding in FA Cup win over Millwall, says Lions boss Neil Harris
Sunday 12 March 2017 17:32, UK
Millwall boss Neil Harris heaped praise on Mauricio Pochettino's Tottenham after seeing his side suffer a 6-0 FA Cup quarter-final thrashing at White Hart Lane.
A Heung-min Son hat-trick and strikes from Dele Alli, Christian Eriksen and Vincent Janssen sealed Spurs' passage into the semi-finals of the competition and ended League One Millwall's 17-game unbeaten run.
Harris' side had conceded just once in their previous 10 games and had knocked out Premier League sides Bournemouth, Watford and Leicester earlier this season. But they had no response to a free-flowing Tottenham.
"We all came today with inspiration from what the FA Cup is about and what we've achieved in previous rounds," said Harris. "Beating three Premier League sides gave us that inspiration to say this could be another one, a major upset and probably one of the biggest of all time.
"But we also knew Spurs could play really well and cause us some problems. We were under no illusions it was going to be tough. I'm disappointed with the final score but I thought Spurs were outstanding.
"You're always hopeful, even at half-time we were saying 'stay in the game', but the third goal really killed the tie."
Despite the defeat, Harris said Millwall's FA Cup run has had a positive impact on their league form, where they are chasing promotion to the Championship, and can continue to inspire his players during the run-in.
"We've enjoyed this competition," he said. "It's been a great distraction for us. People talk about cup competitions not being needed, that they get in the way but it's given us momentum this year.
"I'm proud of what we've achieved in this competition but it means nothing if we don't now go and get promoted into the Championship.
"We can use it in inspiration in the sense that we want to better ourselves. Today we saw a team much better than us and to improve as a group and individually we need to try to get to the levels we saw out on the pitch. We can certainly use this competition and our previous results as an inspiration."
