Sheffield Wednesday vs Blackburn Rovers. Sky Bet Championship.
HillsboroughAttendance23,504.
Report and highlights from the Sky Bet Championship clash at Hillsborough
Saturday 18 January 2020 18:27, UK
Sheffield Wednesday's play-off push suffered a damaging blow following a 5-0 thrashing home to Blackburn.
A Lewis Holtby brace and an unfortunate Cameron Dawson own-goal had all but sealed the points for Blackburn in a first half which saw Massimo Luongo dismissed for a high tackle.
Captain Darragh Lenihan and Sam Gallagher added to the score in the second half.
Wednesday boss Garry Monk named an unchanged starting line-up from the 2-0 away win against Leeds.
Osaze Urhoghide kept his place and made his first senior home appearance for the Owls. Club captain Tom Lees returned on the bench.
For the visitors, Tony Mowbray made the one change following his side's 1-1 draw with Preston as Joe Rothwell replaced Cornelius Evans.
Neither side really took charge of what was a very quiet first 15 minutes. Gallagher, who looked lively, created a slight opening threading Rothwell through whose cut-back was cleared away by the Wednesday defence.
But Adam Armstrong soon created the opening for Blackburn 19 minutes in. His work down the left created space for a shot which was parried back to him by Dawson. Armstrong then found an unmarked Holtby who neatly slotted past Dawson.
Wednesday's poor start then got worse when Luongo saw red following a high challenge on Lewis Travis just four minutes after the opener.
Blackburn were dominating and deepened 10-man Wednesday's first-half nightmare by doubling their lead in the 36th minute.
Travis' shot was brilliantly tipped onto the post by Dawson before the ball ricocheted off the woodwork, back off the goalkeeper and into the net.
Wednesday's collapse was punished further with Holtby's second of the game just before the break. He got on the end of another Armstrong cross to tap home from close range.
It was more of the same in the second half as Armstrong once again weaved his way through on the left before his cross was nearly turned in by Adam Reach who forced a quick-reaction save from his own keeper.
Blackburn's dominant afternoon continued when Lenihan added a fourth, three minutes after the break.
Stewart Downing received a short corner before his left-footed cross found Lenihan at the far post who guided his volley into the roof of the net.
The Owls then had one of their very few shots in the game when substitute Sam Hutchinson curled a shot just wide of the post from outside the box.
Blackburn could have had more but for Dawson's intervention keeping out Gallagher and Armstrong's efforts.
Gallagher grabbed the fifth for Blackburn in stoppage time, racing through on goal before smashing past Dawson.
Sheffield Wednesday's Garry Monk: "I didn't see it coming at all, it was a horrible day for us. It's difficult to analyse straight away, but the main problem is that it seems like it's always two steps forward, one step back. I think today was self-inflicted, our biggest mistake was the first 10 minutes of the game. We speak about wanting to play on the front foot early in the game and playing in their half, but we turned down that opportunity.
"We kept turning back out, putting team-mates into trouble and inviting needless pressure and mistakes. That set the tone for the game, obviously the red card doesn't help but I'm not going to use that as an excuse. The problem came before that and we got punished today.
"We've come off the back of some good performances and good results, but we seem to shoot ourselves in the foot. There's work to do but that's my job to do that. But we will stick together, the players and I take the responsibility but there's football to be played and we're in a good position despite what happened today."
Blackburn's Tony Mowbray: "Our recent performances have been pretty good, we've worked hard on the training ground and today the fruits of that came in the game. We understand they played with 10 men for over an hour of the game but the first 20 to 25 minutes we were pretty dominant and on the front foot. But obviously the extra man helps take the sting out of the crowd.
"We managed to keep them quiet and got the job done. We don't let anyone play out from the back, we've scored the most goals in the first 15 minutes of the match and that's the way we play. It suits this group of players. It's a pretty young team, we have a lot of 19, 20 and 21-year-olds playing in that team. I think we showed that we can be a threat in this league.
"The attacking side of our game was good today, our defensive side of the game and the concentration was exceptional and we didn't really give them anything. We didn't come here thinking we were going to win 5-0 but we always come believing we can win. We know their team and we know their players."
