Tony Mowbray insists he has no concerns about Blackburn’s run of four-consecutive Championship defeats continuing – as long as they maintain the performance levels they showed in their 1-0 loss at Nottingham Forest.
The Rovers boss was convinced his side deserved something from a game in which Brice Samba produced a fantastic save to keep out Adam Armstrong’s penalty, after the goalkeeper had himself brought down Ryan Nyambe to concede the 73rd-minute spot-kick.
In the end Alex Mighten’s deflected finish in the 26th minute was enough to secure three precious points for Chris Hughton’s side.
Armstrong was far and away Blackburn’s best player, with the forward also denied by the woodwork and Mowbray saw enough from him and the rest of his side not to be too downhearted.
“I have spoken before about my views on football and I have always been performance minded. The performance today was decent,” said Mowbray. “If we can play like that regularly, we will win football matches most weeks.
“This team is a very young team. I don’t think the average age of the team was any more than 22. We had a 17-year-old in midfield. But we were very good. We generally dominated. But it wasn’t to be.
“I quite enjoyed watching the team. I think it is a harsh result but we have to take it.
“I thought Armstrong was Premier League quality in his performance. It was really special, even if he missed the penalty.
“The last few games have been difficult for us but today was like the team we have seen for most of the season. I felt that we were in the ascendancy for most of the game.
“That is the nature of this league. Teams are well coached. They can defend, they can get bodies behind the ball.
“In the final third, we fell a little bit short – even if Armstrong was exceptional.
“There were plenty of positives.”
Forest had chances to have made the winning margin more comfortable with James Garner denied by the crossbar and both Glenn Murray and substitute Lyle Taylor flashing shots narrowly wide.
The hosts had been unlucky to lose 1-0 at Swansea in their previous outing, in a game that they had dominated and Hughton admitted that their luck had balanced out a bit at the City Ground.
He said: “That was hard fought. This is the Championship. We produced our best performance of the season at Swansea on Wednesday and lost the game.
“On the balance of play today, I cannot say it was a game we deserved to win – but on chances, I certainly did, because we had four really good chances.
“I don’t remember Blackburn having a chance beyond the shot from Armstrong, which hit the woodwork.
“But our level of performance was not anywhere near our level at Swansea.
“What you have to do is look at the positives. We needed a wonderful save from Brice for the penalty, but the positives are that it is another clean sheet, we restricted a good side to minimal chances.
“We had to dig deep and make sure we did not concede – but we did that. Even if I do admit that we can play better than that.
“It is a wonderful feeling in the changing room at the moment because the players know that we were not at our best, but they also know how important the three points are.”
