Blackburn Rovers 1-0 Cardiff City: Joe Rankin-Costello nets winner

Joe Rankin-Costello celebrates scoring for Blackburn against Cardiff, his first goal of the season

Blackburn Rovers earned back-to-back Championship wins for the first time this season as they beat Cardiff City.

Cardiff centre-back Dimitrios Goutas had a first-half headed goal controversially disallowed for offside.

After the break, Joe Rankin-Costello put Blackburn in front with a neat low finish from Tyrhys Dolan's pass.

Cardiff had chances to equalise as Callum Robinson fired wide and fellow substitute Ollie Tanner had a fierce shot saved by Leopold Wahlstedt.

But Rankin-Costello's goal was enough to lift Blackburn up to 15th in the Championship table, a point behind Cardiff who slip to 11th.

Rovers have struggled to hit the heights of last season, when they finished seventh in the Championship.

There were positive signs before this month's international break when Jon Dahl Tomasson's men ended a four-match losing run with a 4-0 drubbing of Queens Park Rangers, though they were still only 17th in the table at that point.

Cardiff, meanwhile, had made a promising start to life under Erol Bulut and, after only narrowly avoiding relegation in the previous two campaigns, the Bluebirds came into this game eighth in the table and only one point adrift of the play-off places.

They spent most of the first half on the back foot as Blackburn dominated possession and territory, but without creating many scoring opportunities.

Rovers' best chance fell to Rankin-Costello, who shot wide from Callum Brittain's low cross from the right.

Cardiff thought they had taken the lead against the run of play when Greece centre-back Goutas headed in, but the goal was disallowed as his team-mate Karlan Grant was adjudged to have been in the line of vision of Blackburn goalkeeper Wahlstedt from an offside position.

Cardiff's players vented their fury about the decision to referee Bobby Madley, but he ignored their protests.

Blackburn scored early in the second half as Dolan's through ball freed Rankin-Costello, who fired past Jak Alnwick despite a touch from the Cardiff keeper.

Rankin-Costello then had a glorious chance to double his and Blackburn's tally but he hesitated when clean through on goal and was denied by a superb sliding tackle by Perry Ng.

Cardiff brought on Robinson, Tanner and Rubin Colwill in an attempt to reinvigorate their attack, and Robinson looked lively as he turned and shot narrowly wide.

Tanner then had a powerful effort palmed away by Wahlstedt, but Cardiff's late forays forward were too little too late as Blackburn recorded successive league wins for the first time since March.

Blackburn manager Jon Dahl Tomasson:

"That was a brilliant win against a very good Cardiff side.

"When you have an international break, it can be difficult to get going again, but we got an excellent win at QPR before the break and we backed it up today.

"It was probably not the best game we've played lately and Cardiff are extremely difficult to beat, but we spoke at half-time about getting in the right areas and making runs in behind, and we scored a great goal like that so that was really pleasing to see."

Cardiff manager Erol Bulut:

"Whichever team scored first was going to win the game. Neither side created many chances.

"The referee said it [Goutas' disallowed goal] was offside, but the linesman didn't put his flag up. I was expecting something different… but at the end of the game, when I watched the replay, I could see it was offside.

"In the end, we have to create more chances. We need more communication and focus on the pitch."

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