Blackburn vs Burnley Betting Tips

This is arguably the most intense local derby in the division this year and there will be no love lost when they meet on Saturday lunch-time. Rovers have a score to settle having lost the last time the sides met when Burnley won 2-1 at Ewood en-route to promotion to the Premier League.

However prior to that though Burnley had incredibly gone 35 years without a win in the fixture and generally speaking this isn’t a happy hunting ground for them. The Clarets are certainly the stronger of the two sides right now but with Blackburn having home advantage, the bookies are having a hard time picking a favourite for this game.

Blackburn have been in pretty decent form after a slow start to the season and have lost only 1 of their last 7 Championship fixtures and that largely came about because they were reduced to 10 men in only the 10th minute at MK Dons last weekend.

In midweek they put in a very stubborn defensive performance to pick up a goalless draw at home to high flying Derby and they will be looking for more of the same here against their bitter rivals.

Burnley have taken 7 points from their last 3 games including a win in a Lancashire derby over Bolton. They weren’t great in midweek though, trailing 1-0 going into injury time at 10 man Nottingham Forest but a goal from Matthew Taylor rescued a point.

This is likely to be a hot blooded, physical contest and is a game that will mean everything to the fans although the respective managers will probably be grateful to get it out the way without a damaging defeat. It could therefore be quite a cautious game and with neither side entirely convincing in their creative play, it seems worth backing at least one of them to fail to score at 10/11 not least because Blackburn have kept 4 consecutive home clean sheets.

Rovers are unbeaten at Ewood since the opening day but 3 of the 5 matches since then have ended in draws and two of them ended goalless. Burnley are a strong side and should be capable of getting something out of this one so consider backing it to finish in a 0-0 draw at 17/2.