Blackburn Rovers face the biggest week in their modern history

Alan Shearer, Colin Hendry, Tim Sherwood and Graeme Le Saux. What Blackburn Rovers would give to have players like them at their disposal right now.

But the fact of the matter is they don’t. And if their current crop don’t start picking up points, we’ll see another former Premier League giant slide further down the English football pyramid.

Four points off safety with five games remaining, it’s safe to say manager Tony Mowbray has it all to do.

On face value, Rovers shouldn’t be in this position. They have seven players in their side with Premier League experience and a manager who knows how it feels to win in this division.

So how do they turn things around?

Four points should be the absolute minimum from their next two matches.

They’ll travel to Nottingham Forest on Good Friday before welcoming Bristol City to Ewood Park three days later.

Both of those sides find themselves in a relegation scrap with Blackburn, meaning that by this time next week, we’ll have a much clearer idea of who looks destined for the drop.

The honeymoon period is certainly over now for the former West Bromwich Albion boss in Lancashire. On arriving, he led Rovers to a seven-game unbeaten run, including hard fought victories against Derby County and Wigan Athletic and impressive draws away at Fulham and Norwich City.

Since then though, they’ve lost three on the bounce, although two have been against sides desperately pushing for promotion in Brighton & Hove Albion and Reading.

Their final defeat could be excused with morale understandably low in the Rovers camp.

But it’s time for the squad to dust themselves off and start picking up points. After all, they don’t want to feel like all of their hard work over the last few weeks under Mowbray has been for nothing.

The positives

After their weekend double header, Blackburn will face Wolverhampton Wanderers, Aston Villa and Brentford in their final three games of the season.

By that point, it’s likely that trio will be playing for very little. They’re all safe from the drop zone but too far behind the play-off spots.

Heading into their final few games of the season with nothing at stake, Blackburn could benefit from Wolves, Villa and Brentford experimenting with youth.

That won’t be something Mowbray will be doing though. Far from it, in fact.

But first and foremost it’s crucial Rovers pick up points from each of their next two fixtures. That’ll see them head into their final few games having built up some momentum.

Failure to do that though, and we’re fearing the worst for the former Premier League champs.

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