History repeating as Portsmouth echo Rotherham's charge to Championship

But the Aussie winger believes Kenny Jackett’s men superior attacking quality means they can even outstrip the Millers’ play-off success he was part of in 2018.

Williams played 47 games for Paul Warne’s side as their campaign to reach the second tier succeeded with victory at Wembley against Shrewsbury.

The 27-year-old noted how Pompey are now playing with a similar high-tempo work ethic which worked back then.

Rotherham relied on Kieffer Moore and later former Blues striker Michael Smith to lead the line that season.

Williams believes his current side have more talent going forward than the team he arrived at Fratton Park from last year.

He said: ‘When we were at Rotherham we just worked hard and took our chances.

‘We would score a lot of our goals in 80-plus minutes because we were fitter than teams.

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‘But in terms of goalscorers and ability we have more here.

‘We’ve got different strikers to what we had at Rotherham.

‘It was Smudger who was here and Kieffer Moore for half a season, so we played with a big man.

‘Here we spin it down the sides a lot more.

‘A lot of teams play with three at the back now, so you can pull one of those defenders out and the wingers get at them.

‘It’s happening a bit like that, so we have to maintain the hard work and camaraderie we have going,’

Such was the intensity Rotherham played with in their promotion season and later in their unsuccessful Championship campaign, Warne would often sub both his wingers in games as they ran out of steam.

Williams has taken a lesson from that approach and feels it’s being seen in Pompey’s play currently.

He added ‘We used to change the wingers all the time during games at Rotherham because it was just so demanding, like it is here now.

‘It was a tough season when we went up and once we got into the Championship it got even harder.

‘There were better players and we were still being advised to press, so it would get popped around you.

‘We didn’t have a lot of the ball in the other team’s half, but I still felt we should have stayed up that season. We had enough with our hard work and harassment.’

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