ORJAN NYLAND 8: Made two excellent saves to keep a well deserved clean sheet on his Royals home debut. A safe pair of hands in his opening two games.
ANDY YIADOM 7: Defended strongly down the right hand side to limit Blackburn’s hopes in the second half and stayed disciplined after picking up an early yellow.
MICHAEL MORRISON 7: Never comfortable with the ball at his feet as he looked to go long on a few occasions, but did what he’s good at and put in plenty of blocks and tackles .
TOM HOLMES 7: An improved display that saw him make some good tackles and won plenty in the air.
TOM MCINTYRE 7: Came close to scoring when he hit a low drive into the corner but the keeper came up with an important save. A few nice moments down the left with Ejaria.
DANNY DRINKWATER 6: Misplaced a few simple passes, one of which could have played Swift through for a big chance.
ANDY RINOMHOTA 5: Forced off after 30 minutes with injury and was replaced by John Swift.
JOSH LAURENT 8.5: An outstanding display topped off with a magnificent strike to win the game as he curled the ball into the top right hand corner.
TOM INCE 6: Put in a big shift on the right. Almost opened the scoring when he brought down the ball brilliantly from McIntyre’s cross but was stopped by the keeper.
OVIE EJARIA 6: A positive first-half performance, showed some flashes of attacking impetus and linked well with others in attack.
LUCAS JOAO 6: Had one big chance in the first-half that he should have put away but headed straight at the keeper.
SUBS
John Swift 7, Junior Hoilett, Yakou Meite
