NIALL Huggins is expected to be back in the Sunderland starting XI at Millwall this afternoon, with Tony Mowbray explaining his decision to drop the full-back for the midweek defeat to Huddersfield Town.

Huggins has established himself as a regular in Mowbray's side this season after getting over his injury nightmare but was surprisingly left out for the visit of the Terriers, with Jenson Seelt coming into the team at right-back.

Mowbray received some flak from supporters for the decision after the disappointing defeat and says he completely understands the criticism, but attempted to explain his thinking.

"When you lose a game, everyone can question what you do. In my role, I have to try and see the bigger picture," he said.

"We're playing against a [Huddersfield] team with the second most goals from set plays in the league this season. Why wouldn't you try and bring in a 6ft 4 lad in Jenson who has shown what he can do in the Birmingham game?

"And then you have Niall, who has had huge injury issues during my time at the club. That would have been his second game of the week then rolling straight into a third, it felt like the right game to rotate and to get some more physicality into our backline at the same time.

"And yet I understand it [the criticism], especially as we've gone and conceded from a set play."

"The sad thing for me was that because of my illness, I missed the day where I would have a good chat with the players being rotated out of the team and explain my thinking.

"I've had a chance now to have a good chat, to tell Niall how amazing I think he's been and what a joy he is to work with. I talk about that intensity we need, he brings that in every single thing he does.

"He's a really important figure in our team and there's every reason to think that he'll be back in this weekend."

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While Huggins is expected to be back in the team at The Den this afternoon, it's not clear whether he'll be tasked with shackling ex-Sunderland forward Duncan Watmore.

After missing five games through injury, Watmore played 30 minutes from the bench in last weekend's defeat to Coventry but then missed Millwall's midweek defeat to Ipswich.

Millwall boss Joe Edwards said: “Duncan was a disappointing one because he had a positive impact against Coventry. Then he had a slight irritation with his knee, so we lost Duncan the day before the (Ipswich) game.

“He did rejoin us for training (on Thursday), so we’ll go again tomorrow and assess the fact that yes he is back out on the grass but how ready is he to be back involved in the game after missing out on Wednesday."

Edwards won his first game in charge of Millwall at Sheffield Wednesday before successive defeats in the last week.