Blackburn Rovers vs Swansea City

Blackburn Rovers and Swansea City go head-to-head at Ewood Park in their 2021/22 Championship curtain-raiser.

Despite avoiding a relegation scare in 2020/21, Blackburn finished last season with the lowest points tally since earning Championship promotion in 2018/19 (57). Seeking redemption following a dreadful campaign, the ‘Riversiders’ will be looking to halt a six-game winless Championsh streak against Swansea (D4, L2). A 1-1 draw in their most recent league encounter at this venue accounted for one of the 35 Championship fixtures in which they failed to keep a clean sheet last season. Blackburn were prone to sluggish home starts last season, breaking the deadlock in just eight of their 23 home league matches. The abovementioned draw marked one of the two home Champions League games they failed to win after scoring the opener (W6, D2).

Meanwhile, Swansea’s hopes of securing a keenly-anticipated Premier League return were halted in last season’s play-off final to Brentford. Yet, the ‘Swans’ can draw confidence from boasting the division’s second-best win/draw ratio as pre-match underdogs (W4, D5, L4; 69.23%). Additionally, Swansea’s ability to hold onto a lead saw them win a staggering 90.91% of the Championship games in which they opened the scoring last term (W20, D1, L1). Defensively robust, the visitors conceded the league third-low 39 goals during the regular 2020/21 campaign. Interestingly, each of Swansea’s last three Championship trips to Blackburn ended as a draw. However, Steve Cooper, who guided Swansea to back-to-back play-off appearances, stepped down from the managerial seat, with Russell Martin taking over the reins.