OPPONENTS: Blackburn Rovers Football Club
MANAGER: Tony Mowbray
NICKNAME: Rovers or The Riversiders
LEAGUE POSITION: 10th
THE JOURNEY: Fratton Park to Ewood Park – It’s a long one, over 500 miles round trip, best part of 5 hours each way.
LAST TIME OUT:
* Two early goals essentially ended the game before it got started at Doncaster on Tuesday, Pompey did get one back thanks to a freak own goal, but it wasn’t enough to stop the Blues from falling to a 2-1 defeat.
* Blackburn made hard work of bottom of the league Plymouth on Tuesday, with Bradley Dack scoring in first half stoppage time to equalise, but despite having plenty of chances they found themselves unable to get all 3 points as it finished 1-1.
POMPEY STATS:
* Pompey haven’t experienced back to back loses for 259 days, when they suffered consecutive defeats at home to Exeter and away to Wycombe.
* Conor Chaplin reached the 100 game milestone on Tuesday with his substitute appearance. This saw him join Burgess (101), Bennett (107) and Evans (107) in the 100 club. 73 of those appearances have been as a substitute.
* Pompey have scored in 22 of their last 25 competitive matches, and have scored in all but 3 away matches in the last 14 months.
* Dion Donahue became the third Pompey player to see red this season (with Lowe and Evans) after his straight red on Tuesday – more than the team received all of last season (2).
* Top Scorer: Pitman (9), Hawkins (3), Chaplin/Lowe/Kennedy/(2)
BLACKBURN STATS:
* Rovers have had a reasonably slow start by their standards to the League One campaign following last season’s relegation. They sit 10th, but only 2 points outside the play-offs with 2 games in hand on many teams around them.
* Blackburn have only conceded 1 goal in their 6 wins this season, three of which have finished 1-0.
* Despite having one of the largest stadiums in the league (Capacity: 31,367), Blackburn only boast an average attendance of 10,708, meaning 2/3rds of Ewood Park is empty on match days.
* Blackburn Rovers are the only team outside of the Premier League to have won the Premier League since it’s rebrand in 1992. That triumph came in 1994/95 season with players including Tim Flowers, Tim Sherwood, Graeme Le Saux, Stuart Ripley, Chris Sutton and Alan Shearer.
* Top Scorers: Dominic Samuel (4), Charlie Mulgrew & Marcus Antonsson (3)
HEAD TO HEAD (Courtesy of Pompeyrama.com):
* Pompey and Blackburn have met a whopping 85 times in the last century, with Rovers leading the win tally 37-26 (22 draws).
* The two teams have not met since they shared time in the Premier League together. They met 14 times in 7 seasons in the top flight, with Blackburn winning 8 and Pompey winning 4 (2 draws).
* The last meeting between the two sides finished goalless, whereas the last meeting at Ewood Park in November 2009 finished 3-1 to Rovers, with Jamie O’Hara giving Pompey the lead before a brace from former Blue Jason Roberts condemned Pompey to defeat.
ONE TO WATCH:
* Charlie Mulgrew – On paper, Blackburn have a very experienced team, with the likes of Danny Graham, Peter Whittingham and Corry Evans in their ranks. Mulgrew is in his second season at Rovers and is club captain and at 31, he still has plenty left in the tank and is one of the most dominant center backs in League One. He is the catalyst behind Blackburn’s defence, which is the best outside the Top 2 in the league. He has also chipped in with a few crucial goals this season and will be a force to be reckoned with.
PREDICTION:
* This is our toughest game since Wigan in my opinion. We will be without Donahue for 3 games, so Haunstrup will likely come in, and Brett Pitman could return, although personally I’d like to see him rested for another week and not risk aggravating the injury. Lessons will be learnt after the start at Donny, and I expect a cagey match with few chances. I’d take a point, so I’ll plump for a 0-0.
NEXT 5 GAMES:
Sat 28th Oct – Bradford (H) – League One
Sat 4th Nov – Luton Town (A) – FA Cup 1st Round
Tue 7th Nov – Charlton (A) – Checkatrade Trophy
Sat 11th Nov – Blackpool (A) – League One
Sat 18th Nov – Southend (H) – League One
FRIPPY’S TEASER:
Which Pompey hero debuted as a sub against Blackburn, scored winning goals on two different occasions and also missed a penalty against Blackburn?
PUP
Written by PompeyFrippy and originally posted in the forum.
Follow @VitalPortsmouth.
2017-18 Prediction League – October
Blackburn (a) – Saturday 21st October 2017 – click here.
Bradford (h) – Saturday 28th October 2017 – click here.
