THE DACK ATTACK BASHES BANTAMS
TONY Mowbray has challenged his Blackburn side to keep their nerve in the final eight games of the season as they chase promotion to the Championship.
Rovers were in control from start to finish as they dominated Bradford on Thursday, second-half goals from Bradley Dack and Craig Conway sealing the points as Mowbray’s men avoided defeat at home for the 17th game in a row.
Dack put in yet another excellent performance for the hosts, netting his 16th league goal of the season as Blackburn kept the pressure on Shrewsbury and Wigan at the top of League One.
Mowbray said: “We can’t affect either of those two teams now. We have to focus on each football match we can affect.
“We’ve got eight opportunities to get three points, so we just have to keep going, keep ticking along.”
Mowbray’s Blackburn were certainly ticking along nicely against Bradford, showing intent right from the start.
With just five minutes on the clock, last man Nathaniel Knight-Percival was lucky to escape with only a caution after pulling down Dominic Samuel, who looked clean through on goal.
Marcus Antonsson missed with a free header from six yards out and Bradford survived a goalmouth scramble, during which Blackburn struck the post and the bar, all within the first 22 minutes.
Mowbray said: “Looking at the clock with 25 minutes gone, it felt like we’d had a dozen shots but it just wasn’t going to happen – it wasn’t going in for us.
“When you’ve been in football a long time, you know there are days where you can dominate and feel as if you should be on top and you find yourself a goal down.
“We were really focused to make sure that didn’t happen.”
Blackburn continued their assault on the Bradford goal after the break and on 68 minutes, Dack struck, timing his run well to latch on to Corry Evans’ lovely through ball and slot perfectly past the onrushing Colin Doyle.
Twelve minutes later, Dack interchanged beautifully with Adam Armstrong, whose blocked shot ricocheted to the feet of substitute Conway.
He controlled with his first touch and fired home with his second, just 75 seconds after replacing Antonsson. Bradford mustered a few half-chances as the game went on but poor finishing from Omari Patrick kept Blackburn goalkeeper David Raya’s evening very quiet.
Bantams boss Simon Grayson said: “We said at half-time that we’d got away with it because we could have been a couple down. “We had to be brighter with the ball, without the ball we had to be better in the second half, but we didn’t do any of those things.
“The urgency was not there that’s required to win a game and we got out of the game what we deserved, and that’s nothing.”
BLACKBURN (4-4-2): Raya 6, Bennett 7, Lenihan 6 (Downing 30 7), Williams 7, Bell 7, Smallwood 8, Evans 8, Dack 9, Armstrong 8, Samuel 7 (Payne 65 6), Antonsson 6 (Conway 78 8) Subs not used: Whittingham, Leutwiler, Caddis, Payne, Conway, Nuttall
BRADFORD (5-3-2): Doyle 8, Vincelot 6 Knight-Percival 4, Kilgallon 5, McMahon 6, Gilliead 5 (McCartan 64 6), Guy 6 (Dieng 72 6), Law 6, Warnock 6, Poleon 6 (Patrick 64 5), Wyke 6 Subs not used: Chicksen, Raeder, Devine, Grodowski