Championship: Manager Steve Evans loving life at Rotherham United

Rotherham manager Steve Evans is glad he will be in the visiting dugout for their Championship clash with Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday.

The Scot could have been managing the Owls after becoming a target for chairman Milan Mandaric following Dave Jones' sacking last December and was the subject of an official approach.

But that was rejected by the Millers, with Evans then going on to lead his club to promotion from League One.

Evans is proud that he made it on to Mandaric's wanted list, but is loving life at New York and is glad to be on the visiting bench.

"I could have been in the other dugout. But I've never been a manager who reminisces," Evans said ahead of the South Yorkshire derby at Hillsborough.

"There are other managers sitting at Championship clubs recently where I could have been sat in their dugout.

"It's not about reminiscing about where you could have been. I have got a fantastic job here working for a fantastic man.

"And I work for a wonderful football club. That has been a common theme in all my time here at the New York. It's something I really feel passionately about.

"As a manager you should never forget there are a lot of good managers not working and when another club makes an approach for you to be their manager I think you should always be proud.

"The fact it was a big club like Sheffield Wednesday makes you enormously proud, they are a big club with a history and tradition and fanbase and everything else that comes with it but it wasn't right for me.

"I have got the most loyal whole-hearted chairman that I could wish to work for. In the future that partnership will break because he'll either sack me or I'll leave to manage Celtic!

"I won't be going to prove a point. Sheffield Wednesday have a talented manager in Stuart Gray and he has done a great job."

Evans has already masterminded one success over Wednesday in his two-and-a-half-year stint at the Millers - a Capital One Cup success last season - and is keen to emulate famous names in the club's history who have delivered three points at Hillsborough - notably Ronnie Moore.

"There has been some great derbies between both teams, and it has been both ways," he added. "If I can emulate what Ronnie, who is an absolute icon in the town, did in bringing the three points back across the motorway, it would be fantastic.

"More importantly for me, it would take us level with them on points. We'd be sitting in the middle of the pack before a two-week break.

"The things you remember in football aren't the mundane, every-day wins, it's the big key moments.

"Derby matches you win are always special. I can never forget we beat Leeds recently, I can never forget we beat Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United within a couple of weeks of each other last season.

"It's days like that that live with you forever. The opposite end of that isn't worth thinking about."

Evans takes his side to face a team who are winless in eight matches and in a real slump.

But despite insisting the pressure will be on Stuart Gray's men, he believes the Owls are favourites.

"The pressure is on Wednesday," he said. "The pressure is that they're the home side, and if you're the home side you have a certain degree of responsibility to go and try to win a football match.

"As an away team, you have a responsibility to take something from the game. That's how football works.

"It will be hum-dinging, Sheffield Wednesday start as big favourites.

"We are the underdogs, no one gives us a chance around the country. We have to go there in adversity and win a football match, but are we capable? Yes, absolutely."