Although we beat them twice last season, they were an absolute dog of a team that seemed intent on simply out-muscling the opposition to get results.
In all fairness, it seemed to work as they finished sixth and qualified for
One of the major reasons for their high finish was the 17 goals scored by the most annoying runt in football, Craig Bellamy. That title is now official after his summer switch!
And many used the hunch-backed hitman as a stick to beat ‘Dithering Dave' with last season, but it appears that our manager was right in not signing him as it would have completely soured our otherwise sweet summer.
It was well known at the time that the sticking point for Moyes was an alleged clause in his contract that allowed him to move should a decent offer be made by another club.
Moyes, quite rightly, told him that this was not the way that Everton work and Bellamy instead got his ‘dream move' to
A season later and that very clause has been triggered and Bellamy got another ‘dream move', this time to Liverpool, the club he's supported all his life apparently.
Interestingly, he says he's been there just once as a fan, no surprises there then, and the match he was at was the '89 title decider against Arsenal…stop laughing at the back!
Now how galling would it have been had he done the business for us last year only to move to the dark side at the first opportunity? Well done Dave I say!
Anyway, back to
And before any Rovers' fans start bleating about how they were treated harshly they also committed 572 fouls last season, which was more than all but
It appears that they've picked up this season where they left off last as they have already had two players sent off! To be fair to Rovers though, Andy Todd's red card has been rescinded and he's available tonight, and everyone knows that Lucas Neill is just a second rate hatchet man so a red card for him is never a surprise!
Speaking of Neill, he's apparently been linked with a move to Liverpool as Benitez appears to be trying his hardest to assemble the most irritating squad of players since, well since Mark Hughes had Bellamy and Savage in the same
But, no doubt, Benitez will wait until Neill is up before the beak, or has at least had his collar felt by the
And so to tonight's match…Moyes has hinted strongly that he will be rotating the squad quite regularly this season and will use all of the available options open to him.
Leon Osman is back after missing the
It's likely then that we'll go 4-5-1 with Johnson up front and either Osman or McFadden supporting him from midfield.
Nuno Valente will face a late fitness test but is likely to miss the game as he is suffering from a dead leg after that over the top challenge on him on Saturday. If he does miss out then Lescott may fill in at full back.
Historically, we've had some memorable wins at Ewood Park and last season's 2-0 victory sticks out for Arteta's sweet strike and the Blackburn fans blaming the whole thing on Todd's sending off.
In an attempt to level things up we then had Iain Turner sent off 10 minutes into the return match at Goodison and then put in our performance of the season to win 1-0.
In 1998/99 season, we had the Bakayoko brace in our 2-1 win that went a long way to easing our own relegation worries and heightening theirs (they actually went down that year).
And then there was the famous 3-2 win during Rovers' return to the top flight in 1992/93.
Blackburn were flying high in third position but two goals from Cottee and one from Ebbrell sealed a 3-2 win to put one over Dalgleish…which is always sweet!
Of the 12 games we've played at
But we could really do with picking up at least a point tonight as we travel to Spurs on Saturday…and we all know the script down there!
Oh yeah, I'll go for another 2-1 to the Blues.