Blackburn Rovers were given a reminder of collapsed transfer in Birmingham win: View | OneFootball

Highlights

Blackburn Rovers continued their fine recent form on Wednesday night, with a 4-2 victory over Birmingham City at Ewood Park.

That win over Wayne Rooney's side made it back to back wins for the Lancashire club, following their 3-0 win at Stoke City at the weekend.

Indeed, that now extends Rovers' run to six wins in their last eight league games, a string of results that has lifted them to seventh in the Championship table, just two points adrift of the play-off.

As a result, those connected with the Ewood Park club, may well be hoping that Jon Dahl Tomasson's side may now once again be able to mount a sustained push for a play-off place this season.

However, when it came to this latest win for Blackburn in midweek, things may have been rather easier for them, had it not been for the intervention of Siriki Dembele.

How did Siriki Dembele perform for Birmingham against Blackburn?

With Blackburn seemingly in cruise control after a 15 minute blitz immediately after half-time saw them race into a 3-0 lead, Dembele was able to almost single-handedly drag his side back into the game.

Having already rattled the crossbar in the first-half with the score at 0-0, Dembele then scored two spectacular goals to reduce the deficit from three to one in the space of 15 minutes.

First, the winger produced a brilliant piece of skill to get past Callum Brittain before cutting into the Blackburn area and curling an excellent strike into the far top corner.

Then, the 27-year-old would produce a thumping effort from the edge of the area that fired into the roof of the net, forcing Blackburn to endure a nervy final 12 minutes of normal time, before Harry Leonard made the points safe for the hosts in stoppage time.

That of course, meant Dembele's efforts were ultimately for nothing. Even so, this was still a standout performance from the Birmingham man, and one that it could be argued, will have served as a reminder to those watching on from a Blackburn perspective, of what might have been.

Why might Dembele's performance have resonated with Blackburn?

While Dembele may have been playing for Birmingham on Wednesday night, things could have rather different had things previously gone in a different way.

Speaking back in February 2022, Peterborough chairman Darragh MacAnthony revealed that Blackburn had seen a bid accepted for Dembele, at a time when the winger departed the Posh to join AFC Bournemouth.

With the winger subsequently finding it difficult to settle in while at The Vitality Stadium, some reports then claimed that Blackburn were in advanced talks to sign Dembele from Bournemouth late in the 2022 summer transfer window.

Ultimately though, no move to take him to Ewood Park would materialise, and the winger would instead complete a permanent move to Birmingham, this summer, signing a three-year contract at St Andrew's.

Ironically, at that point, Rovers would themselves be strengthening their wide options, with Andrew Moran joining on a season-long loan from Brighton, and Arnor Sigurdsson pausing his contract with CSKA Moscow, to join the Ewood Park club on an initial one-year deal.

Even beyond that, it seems wingers were still something Blackburn wanted to bring in, with the club's Director of Football Gregg Broughton revealing that a loan move for another winger had fallen through for financial reasons on deadline day.

Had Rovers managed to complete a deal for Dembele however, then the need to bring in those wingers this summer may well have been reduced, particularly if the 27-year-old had been able to make the sort of impacts at Ewood Park that he did on Wednesday night, on a regular basis.

Indeed, with his double at Blackburn on Wednesday night, Dembele has now found the net five times in 14 Championship games for Birmingham since the start of the campaign.

While there can be no denying that both Moran and Sigurdsson have made some significant and incredibly positive contributions for Blackburn over the course of the season so far, they have by comparison, scored a combined total of four goals in 25 games so far this season.

As a result, given the desire for new and additional sources of goals there was at Rovers to fill the voids left by the departing Ben Brereton and Bradley Dack, it does seem as though they may have been able to ease those needs, at least to some extent, had they previously been able to get a deal done for the Birmingham winger.

So with all that in mind, Blackburn may now be wishing more than ever that their previous attempts to sign Dembele had been successful after what they saw first-hand from him on Wednesday night, not least because it would surely have made watching that game, rather less stressful.