Reading boss Ince full of praise for striker Carroll

Reading manager Paul Ince heaped praise on Andy Carroll after the veteran striker helped his side to a first Sky Bet Championship victory in seven matches – 2-1 at home to struggling Rotherham.

The Millers took a deserved 37th-minute lead through right-back Lee Peltier, but Carroll levelled early in the second half with a powerful header and also claimed an assist for substitute Tyrese Fornah to nod in a dramatic 90th-minute winner.

“I knew that once we got the first goal our crowd would come alive and we would all start to believe again,” Ince said.

“It was a wonderful header from Andy. You could see it coming (from a Femi Azeez free-kick) and you just knew that he was going to win it. It was fantastic.

“Andy just frightens the life out of people.

“I’m not sure whether we deserved to win. I thought we started quite well in the first half but then, for some reason, we sort of came off it.

“We played into Rotherham’s hands and played their game rather than playing ours.

“It was scrappy, it was just one of those games. At times we looked tired, we looked jaded and we couldn’t get to the ball.

“All the things that you don’t want as a manager were happening. And then we’re suddenly 1-0 down, when no one really deserved to be winning the game.

“We needed to get more up the park in the second half and that’s what we did. It put the pressure on Rotherham and I knew that they would get tired.”

Rotherham, just four points clear the relegation zone, saw their four-game unbeaten run come to an end.

“That was tough to take,” Millers manager Matt Taylor said. “But football is a simple game to evaluate and we shouldn’t have given away those set-pieces that led to the goals. They were preventable.

“Carroll is obviously a focal point for Reading, a real handful, but I can’t hide my frustration at our inability to defend at those moments.

“We had to defend those balls into the box better than we did, there was a mismatch in terms of physicality in there.

“I felt that we were the better team, we played the better football and created the better chances.

“But I’m sat here now with a 2-1 scoreline against us.

“Yes, we’ve been on a pretty good run, but we need to pick up more points. A good run, a good performance tonight, but no points.

“It’s all about the points and that’s why it’s so frustrating. We planned, we prepped, but our execution in these moments was what cost us tonight.”