Sam urges for calm before the storm

Rovers boss Sam Allardyce is asking fans, players and officials for calm before Sundays derby.

Allardyce is keen that it won't be the Rovers players losing their heads at the crucial moments prefering to concentrate on the task at hand - that being 3 points and a massive derby win.

He who is large has also called for the fans to stay patient in the heat of the battle.

Big Sam, speaking to rovers.co.uk said - 'It's a huge responsibility, not only for the players but the fans and the officials, I will be emphasising to my players not to over-react which can happen with the adrenaline rush which comes in this particular derby.

'Sometimes the red light comes on, the red mist comes down and I hope that's not going to be any of our players on Sunday. I'm not trying to put any extra more pressure on the officials - Chris Foy and his assistants are very experienced so they will understand what it's about.

'Chris will have handled derby matches before and will know what's going on and calming players down with the right word in their ear at the right time will be very important.

'This match has been talked about since Burnley got promoted as it has been so long since they met each other in the league. We have been in the Premier League for ten years now and are an established top-flight side so that means everyone expects us to win but it's not like that in a derby.

'For the fans we feel we have to win. We know the responsibility that lies on us. I'm sure many Blackburn and Burnley fans work together and we want the Blackburn fans to go home as happy as they can be and looking forward to getting up and going to work on Monday morning and bumping into that Burnley fan saying 'we've got one over on you'.'

Sam has got this just about right here in my opinion. We do need calm and composed heads on the pitch (especially with Diouf on there!) as well as the always mandatory passion.

The winner will be the one that performs best during those crucial little moments.

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