Blackburn 3 - 0 City

[MLS 0]

Worthington was forced to shuffle his pack a little, after Edworthy picked up an injury in training on Friday. That meant Charlton was asked to cover at right back, allowing Drury to return at left-back. And Brennan made it a trio of left-backs in the starting XI, playing on the left side of midfield. Doherty and Fleming continued their partnership in front of Greeno. Graham Stuart was asked to provide the width on the right, with Holt and Francis in their usual central rôles. Huckerby and Ashton completed the 4-4-2 line up, with McKenzie having to settle for a place on the bench.

Once again, City started brightly and for the first quarter of an hour they looked the better team. Huckerby had a half-chance to put us ahead, getting in behind the Rovers defence, but he spooned his shot over the bar.

Then, on 17 minutes, a long cross-field ball eluded Charlton, and Pederson was able to bring the ball down and fire goalwards from the corner of the box. Greeno looked to have it covered, but then it dipped slightly just as he tried to block it, giving Blackburn an undeserved lead.

City countered immediately and should have equalised when Huckerby got to the by-line and pulled it back perfectly for Brennan, but the Canadian miscued horribly from twelve yards with the goal at his mercy. Shortly after City carved open the Rovers defence yet again, this time with Holt finding Ashton on the edge of the box. Unfortunately, the City striker was unable to curl his shot beyond Friedel, who parried the ball back into play. Fortune was on the keeper’s side, though, with the ball rebounding a little behind Stuart preventing an easy tap in.

The two sides then traded free-kicks, with Stuart curling our effort comfortably into Friedel’s arms and Pederson forcing a great save at the other end. However, from the resulting corner, Pederson’s cross was met at the near post by Dickov and his glancing header just squeezed in to make it two-nil.

McKenzie replaced Brennan at the break, but the second half was played out in horrendous conditions, with torrential rain interspersed with thunder and lightning. That did little for the quality of the football on display, but I don’t think that can excuse Ashton’s misplaced cross-field pass which led to Rovers’ third. Gallagher intercepted and fed the ball to Dickov. Doherty allowed the pint-sized striker to turn and then work space for a shot. Yet again Greeno looked to have it covered, but a combination of a late swerve and the wet ball meant that it slipped through and into the net.

Savage then did what Savage does best: winding up the opposition! Francis won the ball, but tangled with Savage and as the two players moved back into position Savage gave Francis a slight push. Francis said something and Savage pushed him again. Francis decided actions spoke louder than words and decided to push back, but the ref decided it was a push too far and showed the City player a yellow card. Job done, Savage.

As the half wore on Blackburn created several decent chances and City looked distinctly second best. Greeno showed great character to put his two errors to the back of his mind and made a few good saves. The best of these was a double save right at the end, when he did well to stop Reid’s drive and got up to make an even better save from Gallagher’s effort on the rebound. MLS

[Canarychick 0]

Off all the people to score (and twice!) it had to be Dickov

I really thought after the comeback against WBA we could go to Blackburn and get at least a point.

[NavMan 0]

Trouble is Canary Chick that has been our downfall this season.  When we have got a good result we all believed we could then progress from there believing that the team would have benefitted from a rise in confidence getting out of the relegation 3 etc etc etc.  Then we play a game whom we should expect to at least get a point from and we completely blow it.  A severe lack of any sort of cinsistency has been our biggest problem this year and will unfortunately I believe leave us relegated at the end of the season.