Gary Rowett hailed Millwall’s first away Championship win of the season – a 2-1 success at Bristol City – as a huge psychological boost.

The visitors took a 44th-minute lead when Tom Bradshaw fired home after his header was well saved by Max O’Leary, only for City to strike back through Shaun Hutchinson turning a 71st-minute cross from substitute Cameron Pring into his own net.

An error from O’Leary, who failed to gather a long free-kick on the edge of his box, allowed Zian Flemming to slot the winner into an unguarded net from 15 yards five minutes later and the City keeper’s late penalty save from Benik Afobe counted for nothing.

And a delighted Lions boss Rowett said: “Winning away is hugely symbolic for us. There was a little bit of a psychological block building up, which has now been removed.

“The longer a run like we were on continues, the harder it is to end. You start to get nervous at crucial times in games.

“Our recent game at Rotherham showed the players that if we work hard enough to play with intensity, a defensive aggression and forward quality we can get results.

“We should have won that match and coming to face a Bristol team with their tails up after winning in the week, we knew exactly what we had to do.

“I felt we managed the game well and was disappointed we weren’t ahead before we scored. In the first half we settled on the ball and began to control things.

“We didn’t come under huge pressure and created some very good moments, which we should have scored from.

“Tom Bradshaw’s goal summed him up because it came from sheer perseverance. He works so hard for the team.

“We got a bit of luck with the second goal, which resulted from a mistake, but the ball dropped to just the right man in Zian.

“I’m sorry for Benik that he couldn’t convert the late penalty, but he will come again and will be needed during a busy period of fixtures.”

City boss Nigel Pearson felt his side could have earned a point on another day.

He said: “We matched Millwall physically and the least we should have got was a point, had we been streetwise.

“But it was the same old story of gifting poor goals and making some very strange decisions on the pitch. One at the end from our throw-in led to us conceding a penalty.

“It is so frustrating to go from an encouraging midweek win to another hit-and-miss display. But there was no shortage of effort and commitment.

“We knew exactly what to expect from Millwall. They are physical, direct and very effective.

“To cope with all that as we did and then give them their goals in such fashion is hard to take.

“I heard Max O’Leary’s call for the ball from the bench ahead of the second one. Perhaps he should have gone for a punch, but I would rather he acted decisively and it wasn’t all down to him that they scored.

“We weren’t at our best going forward either. That has been our strength this season, but today things didn’t quite happen and a few passes went astray.

“Now we face a tough week on the road with two away games and there will be some selection decisions to make.”