the championship

BLACKBURN ROVERS 1 Graham (45) BIRMINGHAM CITY 1 Jutkiewicz (3) pen

DANNY GRAHAM struck in first-half injury time to deny Gianfranco Zola a first win as Birmingham boss following a draw at Blackburn.

Graham popped up to notch his ninth goal in the last 11 league outings after Owen Coyle’s side had made a sloppy start that is becoming all too familiar.

They were behind after three minutes when former Burnley striker Lukas Jutkiewicz dispatched a carelessly-conceded penalty for his 11th of the season. There was little to separate the sides, though Ryan Shotton and Sam Gallagher passed up presentable opportunities to add to the scoring.

The result does neither side much good. Birmingham are marooned in mid-table, and have now failed to win in eight games.

Blackburn remain in the bottom three after winning just one of their last eight league outings.

Rovers’ bad habit of making slow starts was their undoing in the third minute when the Blues were awarded a penalty after Jason Steele needlessly came out to meet David Cotterill and brought him down.

Jutkiewicz stepped up and, although Steele got something on the penalty, the ferocity saw it bounce off him and in.

The shell-shocked hosts were lucky not to be two down 10 minutes later when Che Adams powered forward on the left. His ball dissected the Rovers defence and left Cotterill one-on-one with Steele, who stood tall to parry the powerful drive inside the area.

The first half ended in a flourish as Rovers drew level in added time when Hope Akpan found Derrick Williams on the left and his low cross found Graham who emphatically hammered home.