Neil Harris has announced that Fred Onyedinma’s absence from the team this week is due to the winger telling him he does not want to play for the club.

Onyedinma, 22, has been rumoured with a move away from The Den this summer after he only made one senior appearance for the Lions after being recalled from his loan at Wycombe Wanders in January.

However, it was assumed that the winger would be given a clean slate to impress as in addition to featuring and scoring in the Lions’ first pre-season friendly against Concord Rangers, the Nigerian also gained minutes against Fleetwood Town and SC Braga whilst at Millwall’s training camp in Portugal.

“I took him pre-season because we needed numbers. Fred has made it very clear that he won’t play for the club,” Harris said.

“ So I am not going to include him in front of our fanbase at games, unless he tells me otherwise that he wants to play for our fans then he won’t be included in any game of football for us.

“We needed him to play, we needed 22 players. You always hope that people change their mind, I think highly of the boy and I have a very good relationship with him but sometimes I just have to be a manager and go with what it is.

“We used him because we needed to, and because he has to get minutes. Now we are preparing for Saturday with the players who want to be here.”

Aside from that, Harris also reiterated that Millwall are working hard behind the scenes to bring in another player to accompany Jasyson Molumby, who signed on-loan from Brighton on Tuesday, before their final pre-season game against Real Sociedad on Saturday.

“We were really pleased to get Jayson in, a lot of people would not of heard of him or know of him and they would have spoken to their mates at Brighton who would be raving over him, and then looked at stuff from Toulon in the summer and thought ‘wow what a player he is going to be’.”

“He is a long way off fitness so won’t be included on the weekend.

“In regards to the next one coming in, I will see Steve Kavanagh some stage tonight to find out if we have progressed, but it is progressing and I expect another player in.

“Before Saturday? I hope so, there’s a real potential to it.”