Coyle on the way up
OWEN COYLE was delighted to see his Blackburn side end Newcastle’s nine-game winning run — but the Rovers boss insists it would be wrong to describe the away win as a shock.
Charlie Mulgrew’s second-half strike condemned Newcastle to their first defeat since mid-September, and lifted the visitors out of the relegation zone.
Blackburn won just one of their opening nine matches in all competitions this season, but they have taken 11 points from their last seven games and were deserved victors at St James’ Park.
Coyle said: ‘There is a lot of perception in football and people see the table and think Blackburn are a poor team — but nothing could be further from the truth.
‘We took two points from our first seven games and there was a lot going on at the club. I think it is now 17 points from 11 games. That is close to play-off form.
‘We stuck to the game-plan, we asked them to stand toe-to-toe, we marked them man-for-man all over the park. We knew we would have to do a lot of dirty work. Jason Steele made one wonderful save off Ciaran Clark from second phase of a corner. I can’t really remember any other saves. We were a threat all day.’
Newcastle’s defeat came after Rafael Benitez made six changes from the side that had won at Leeds United last weekend, and the Spaniard conceded he had perhaps erred with his team selection.
‘I didn’t like our reaction when we were losing, and we have to do better,’ said Benitez.
‘We have to analyse what happened before the next game and make sure we don’t make the same mistakes.’