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Watford vs Blackburn Rovers. Sky Bet Championship.

12:00pm, Sunday 27th August 2023.

Vicarage RoadAttendance17,810.

Blackburn Rovers 1

R Hedges (72nd minute)

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Watford 0-1 Blackburn Rovers: Ryan Hedges earns Jon Dahl Tomasson's men smash-and-grab away win

Report and free match highlights from the Sky Bet Championship match between Watford and Blackburn Rovers at Vicarage Road as Ryan Hedges' goal earned Jon Dahl Tomasson's men a second win of the season

Dan Long

Digital football journalist @DanLong__

Sunday 27 August 2023 14:58, UK

Watford extended their winless run to four games in all competitions after Blackburn came away with a smash-and-grab 1-0 win on Sunday afternoon.

Matheus Martins had the best of the chances for the Hornets - whose 21 shots dwarfed Rovers' five - and crashed an unstoppable shot onto the crossbar half an hour in.

But the only goal of the game came after 72 minutes, when Ryan Hedges took over after Lewis Travis could lead the counter no longer, controlled the ball with two neat flicks and fired in from the tightest of angles.

Blackburn move up to ninth as a result of their second league win of the season and first since the opening day, while Watford stay down in 15th, with four points from four games.

Blackburn leave Watford to rue missed chances again

Keen to start making their way towards the higher reaches of the table after one win, one draw and one defeat each in their first three league outings, both teams set a great tempo in the mild lunchtime air in Hertfordshire.

Twenty minutes in, Blackburn forced the first save, when Sammie Szmodics struck a shot straight at Daniel Bachmann after receiving the ball on the half-turn and, within minutes, Martins had reacted quickest to force Aynsley Pears into a similar stop at the other end.

With the visitors lacking a touch of zest in the final third, Watford started to assert themselves thereafter and came so close to taking the lead when Martins cut in off the right, unleashed a shot and rattled the crossbar.

Martins continued in the same vein after the break, but could find no way through. Blackburn, however, did.

Sam Gallagher set Travis away on the counter, but he ran out of steam before he could bear down on goal; an attempted clearance took the ball across to Hedges, who expertly flicked it past Wesley Hoedt, flicked it up again and squeezed in a shot from a narrow angle.

Inside the final 10 minutes, there was time for Martins to try his luck one last time with a low shot after Imran Louza kept Tom Ince's cross alive, but Pears dived to push the shot onto the post.