Blackburn shrugged off the disappointment of being dumped out of the Uefa Cup in midweek with a hard fought 2-1 home win over Birmingham.

When these two clubs met ten days ago in the Carling Cup Rovers were comfortable 3-0 winners and after David Bentley had given them a first half lead followed by a second from substitute Benni McCarthy from the penalty spot just after the break, it looked like a repeat scoreline was possible.

But this was a different Birmingham team and they fully deserved their goal on 68 minutes when Cameron Jerome lashed home from 15 yards to set up a nervy finale for the home side that had lost their last three Premier League games against Midlands opposition.

Rovers goalkeeper Brad Friedel was called upon to make a fine save in time added on to make it 1 defeat in the last 14 Premier League games for Mark Hughes.

"I thought it was a big performance by us," said the Rovers boss.

"We were a little bit off the pace in the first half and that was a consequence of our efforts on Thursday night.

"In the second half we got our second wind and were good value for the win in the end. Obviously we had to withstand a few high balls into the box near the end but we showed our qualities with the walking wounded we had out there today.

"We stuck at it and got the three points we deserved."