Hughes proud of courageous ten March 22 2008
Blackburn Rovers boss Mark Hughes commended his 10-man side after their 3-1 victory over Wigan kept alive their hopes of UEFA Cup football.
Paraguay striker Roque Santa Cruz began and ended the scoring with two close-range headers in the 11th and 63rd minutes.
Wigan had equalised through Marlon King's 17th-minute penalty - for which Christopher Samba was sent off for bringing down Emile Heskey - but Jason Roberts scored against his former club on the stroke of half-time to put the hosts back in front.
Despite their numerical disadvantage - until Wilson Palacios was sent off with 20 minutes to go for a second bookable offence - Rovers were by far the better side and Hughes was delighted.
"I thought we were excellent, a lot of big performances today," said the Rovers boss.
"We got ourselves in a good position 1-0 up and were quite comfortable.
"There was little bit of a mix up on the throw in and Heskey got a clean run through. Chris tried to get back, put a hand on his shoulder and we felt he (Heskey) went down a bit too easily.
"In the circumstances you usually expect a penalty to be given and that was the case.
"But the punishment did not fit the crime; they scored the penalty, it is 1-0 and you are down to 10 men but we regrouped and changed the shape."
The victory lifted Rovers to within a point of sixth-placed Portsmouth and Hughes added: "It was a key game for us. We had games against Fulham (1-1) and West Ham (2-1 defeat) where we had slipped up and that was disappointing.
"Today it was really important we won and I said beforehand the players had to understand the significance of te game and as a consequence we got a really good performance."
Santa Cruz's first goal came when England goalkeeper Chris Kirkland parried David Bentley's shot up in the air and the Rovers striker pounced inside the six-yard box.
His second was via a similar route, this time the England midfielder crossing from the left to the far post for the Paraguayan to nod in his 14th league goal of the season.
Either side of that King scored his first goal for Wigan since his January transfer from Watford before Roberts, latching on to Santa Cruz's flick on, turned his marker inside out before firing left-footed past Kirkland.
Wigan boss Steve Bruce was bitterly disappointed with the result, especially as it brought to an end a four-match unbeaten run which had garnered eight points.
He felt a contributory factor to the defeat was an injury to Kirkland in the opening minutes, the England goalkeeper falling awkwardly and hurting his back.
"For the standards we have set both individually and collectively we never got started," he said.
"The afternoon was summed up in the first three minutes when Kirky's got injured.
"I think all through the game you could see he was not 100% - if he is 100% fit he saves the first goal for start instead of pushing it out.
"Everything went against us. We got a lifeline with the penalty, sticking that away, and I expected us to kick on.
"We didn't. We had all sorts of problems with their midfield players, particularly Bentley, and I thought Santa Cruz was fantastic up front for them."
The sight of left-back Erik Edman leaving the pitch on a stretcher with a suspected ruptured anterior cruciate ligament just before half-time compounded Wigan's misery.
"I think that affected us badly. With the change we didn't have anyone to balance it out," added Bruce.
"It looks like a ruptured anterior ligament and that will be diagnosed in the next 24 hours and if that is the case he is going to be out since September or October time."