CREDIT TO ROVERS’ BOWYER .. AND TO VENKY’S

UNSUNG hero of the season has to be Gary Bowyer at Blackburn.

When he reluctantly took charge, the former Premier League champions were a laughing stock, haemorrhaging fans and sliding pitifully towards League One.

Three managers had come and gone, each staying barely long enough to make introductions before being potted by reviled Indian owners the Venky’s. Each game was a protest, an hour-and-ahalf of depression and anger.

One year on, those turbulent waters have been utterly becalmed. Rovers have lost just two of their last 13 league games, held Man City in the Cup and have stealthily crept to the fringes of the top six.

The fans haven’t come back yet, with average attendances down a few hundred on last year. But success will lure them in, just as embarrassment drove them away.

Bowyer’s greatest feat was to convince his players to ignore the simmering fury of the terraces, to play without fear in a climate of resentment and anger. Now he is making them one of the most resilient units in the division.

For that he deserves enormous credit, but so do the Venky’s. Patently clueless about football – they hadn’t even heard of relegation, remember – Blackburn’s owners learned their trade in the glare of media ridicule. They made some catastrophic decisions and embarrassed themselves and the club.

But in appointing a man from within and then sticking by him, the Venky’s are showing that lessons have – at last – been heeded.

Of course, that apparent enlightenment will be put to the test when Bowyer has a bad run. And one good decision does not make up for the catalogue of errors that resulted in last season’s mess. But for now, the Venky’s deserve a bit of slack.