Blackburn Rovers 0-2 Hull City

Abel Hernandez celebrates opening the scoring for Hull

Hull City moved top of the Championship with victory at Blackburn Rovers, who are now winless in nine games.

After a goalless first half, Hull's Abel Hernandez rounded Jason Steele for his 16th league goal of the season.

Uruguay striker Hernandez then turned provider as he set up Mo Diame to double the advantage from close range.

Blackburn's best chances saw Elliott Ward's tame effort cleared off the line by Andy Robertson and Ben Marshall's fierce shot saved by Allan McGregor.

Steve Bruce's Tigers have now won five of their six league matches in 2016 and moved two points clear of Middlesbrough, who face Leeds at Elland Road on Monday.

Rovers have not won in the league since a 1-0 victory against Rotherham on 11 December.

Paul Lambert's men have scored just 25 goals this season, and having sold their top scorer Jordan Rhodes to Boro in the January transfer window, they once again lacked any fluency in the final third.

Chuba Akpom could have made the scoreline even more convincing for Hull, but fired just wide from distance in injury time, as Blackburn slipped to 19th in the table.

Blackburn manager Paul Lambert:

"In the first half there wasn't much in it. The disappointing thing for me is we had the ball twice and Hull have scored two goals.

"We secured possession and made wrong decisions, and they're a good side. The front two are a handful and they've still got a lot of Premier League players in their side.

"Today I thought once the second goal went in, we looked far short. You can't play the way we did last week and then turn in that performance.

"It will drive you mad. We have to find consistency quickly, really quickly."

Hull manager Steve Bruce:

"We've missed two or three chances late on which could have improved our goal difference but we thoroughly deserved the win in my opinion.

"I thought we were playing within ourselves in the first half and I wanted us to go and express ourselves and take the shackles off.

"We knew we had more in the tank and I thought in the second half we gave a very good performance where we could have scored three or four.

"That's as good as we've played for a long time."