ROVERS NEED TO SHARPEN UP, SAYS MOWBRAY
TONY Mowbray wants Blackburn to make their practice pitch-perfect.
The Rovers boss has pinpointed areas he wants to improve and transfer from the training pitch to matchdays.
“It’s alright practising around the box throughout the week, but we need to find that little bit of quality in order to make the difference on matchdays, because in tight games, we need to make the opposition feel our quality in the final third and we’ve got some talented players who should be able to do that,” said Mowbray.
“Adam (Armstrong) is one who needs to adapt that quality of staying with the ball, because he can’t expect to keep running away from it, bursting in-behind defenders expecting to be played through every time.
“Although it looks amazing when he bursts behind people when the ball is played ahead of him, he has to learn to stay with the ball a bit more, at times.”
He did reserve praise for 20-year-old midfielder John Buckley.
“He tends to stay with the ball and draw fouls, while also sucking opposition players in and having that quality to pop the ball around them, which is what you need to do when you’re trying to break down a defence,” Mowbray added.
Mowbray also admitted that his life has been made tough after losing two of his first-choice back four to injury.
Lef-back Greg Cunningham, 28, was ruled out for the season with a knee ligament injury in October and central defender Darragh Lenihan, 25, is only just back in training.
Mowbray said: “The make-up of the back four now isn’t what it was when we were keeping four clean sheets in six at the start of the season.
“We’re finding a way to lose games and yet we’re in every game, they’re all close and if they fall our way, there’s a different story in the table for us.”