Andy Munro on Blues’ visit to Ewood Park.
The away day woes continue and despite having a moan of Wenger-like proportions, Gary R0wett eventually admitted that Blackburn were the better team. Remember, as well, that this is a Rhodes-less team who are generally struggling which shows nobody is a pushover in this Championship. In fairness, Middlesboro’s loss away to Rotherham puts the complaints by some Bluenoses of our recent nil-nil at the New York Stadium into perspective.
However, none of this should paper over the play-off cracks. Morrison, unusually, had a buffeting from perennial cast off Danny Graham and, of course, when that happens he has to look to the 5′ 9″ figure of Robbo who can’t really help out in that department for support. Our midfield had another off day and, up front, Donaldson got little change from Blackburn’s gargantuan centre backs. That’s usually the time when somebody comes off the bench to make a difference up front but unfortunately we haven’t got that option. Although he’s injured, James Vaughan when fit is still in the B- ‘Tries Hard’ category.
One even wonders whether the young Northern Irish kid who has been scoring goals for fun for the Under 18s etc deserves a ‘Trevor Francis’ moment to give us something completely different. Certainly, if Donaldson is getting no change up front, even with Toral as support, our goal threat is minimal.
In fairness, we hit the woodwork twice and had a stonewall penalty disallowed. It might be the case, when it comes to referees, that we fall into the category of nobody likes us but we don’t care. However, perhaps it’s karma as the Tigers hit the woodwork twice and the ref missed Robbo’s basketball move when they lost to us.
Luckily for Blues, most of the results went our way and (Tractor Boys apart), we have a game in hand. However, it looks increasingly likely that we’ll be ‘entertaining’ our neighbours down the road next season because we are just not playing well or consistently enough to provide cause for any optimism. Put simply, there are six or seven better teams than us although we’ve come along way since the Bournemouth embarrassment.
