Blackburn Rovers 0 Wigan Athletic 1:THEY ARRIVED with visions of Ronaldinho and David Beckham, sacked Sam Allardyce on the grounds he was not the man to deliver Uefa Champions League football and asked a coach with no managerial experience for improvement on a reduced budget.
The calamitous reign of Venky’s, the Indian poultry company who bought Blackburn Rovers in November 2010, has brought the result the club’s suffering support has long feared was inevitable under Steve Kean.
The Championship awaits.
Blackburn would have been seventh in the Premier League had Allardyce won his final game as manager. Defeat left the club 13th, but they were still far removed from the demoralised, dispirited and inexperienced side that meekly slipped out of the top flight for the first time since 2001 after Antolin Alcaraz’s 87th minute header from a Jean Beausejour corner secured Wigan’s status for another season.
Roberto Martinez has overseen a cohesive, impassioned and impressive rise to safety.
Kean, by contrast, has suffered seven defeats in eight games, and condemnation throughout the sorry demise.
Eight players have arrived during Kean’s reign for a cost of more than £20 million (€25 million) but only two – Yakubu Ayegbeni, a steal at less than €2 million from Everton admittedly, and Scott Dann – started against Wigan.
Bradley Orr and Anthony Modeste, a January free and loan signing respectively, completed the number of Kean recruits to a side handed the responsibility of preserving Blackburn’s Premier League status until the final day.
But it was Wigan, and a Rovers support in open revolt, who made the most convincing statement.
Kean took the bold decision to counter the wing-back system that has propelled Wigan towards safety with a three-man attack of Yakubu, Junior Hoilett and Modeste, making only his third start since arriving from Bordeaux. That gave Victor Moses and Shaun Maloney freedom on both flanks to maintain their hugely impressive form, and the visitors should have established a comfortable lead by the time Rovers departed to a chorus of boos at the interval.
The game was played against a backdrop of incessant “Kean Out” chants, demands for Venky’s to sell up and laments for the late Jack Walker. One protestor ran on to the pitch at the start of the second half and threw his season ticket away in disgust – but at Martinez, the Wigan boss. Kean’s bodyguard ran to the manager’s side in complete bewilderment.
Rovers lost Dunn to injury late in the first half and were forced to replace Gael Givet with Radosav Petrovic during the interval after paramedics were called to the Blackburn dressingroom.
Givet suffered a heart scare earlier in the season, but the defender damaged only a hamstring here and took his place on the bench for the second half.
It was not comfortable viewing.
BLACKBURN ROVERS: Robinson, Orr (Goodwillie 80), Dann, Givet (Petrovic 46), Martin Olsson, Hoilett, Dunn (Marcus Olsson 44), Lowe, Pedersen, Modeste, Yakubu. Subs not used: Kean, Formica, Nzonzi, Rochina. Booked: Petrovic, Pedersen.
WIGAN: Al Habsi, Alcaraz, Caldwell, Figueroa, Boyce, McArthur, McCarthy, Beausejour, Moses, Di Santo (Sammon 85), Maloney. Subs not used: Pollitt, Crusat, Ben Watson, Gomez, Rodallega, Diame. Booked: Moses.
Referee: M Clattenburg (Tyne Wear).
