BOSS Sam Allardyce felt that Rovers should have won a tricky cup encounter against Blyth Spartans much more comfortably than they did.

Chances came and went for Rovers in the first half, and at the end they only had Carlos Villanueva's 59th minute free-kick to show for their domination.

Blyth came into the game with a late flurry, but Andy Wright's curling effort went inches past the post as Rovers edged through to a return to the north east in the fourth round against Sunderland.

"We were supposed to beat them four or five, and to be fair we had the chances to do that," said the Rovers boss after the game.

"At times they defended very well and their goalkeeper did very well, but at times we were poor with the converting of our chances.

"It doesn't matter who you are playing, they were always going to throw caution to the wind and throw everybody forward and that they did, they had the one golden chance and they didn't convert.

"They could have taken the game back to Ewood but overall we deserved to win.

"I'm glad we aren't one of the big boys that have gone under, there have been some shock results. It was a hard place to come and play but we were always in control apart from the last ten minutes.

"The goal came at a good time for us because the only thing lacking in our play was the goal, and once we got it I thought we would see the game out more comfortably.

"We didn't get the second to finish them off and so we had to do a bit of desperate defending towards the end.

"It was nice to play a competitive game like this and get through."