THERE was a really good feeling about the club on Saturday.

I’m sure the people in the media who follow Manchester City would have had a pleasant surprise on their return to Ewood Park.

A lot of the talk in the media about Blackburn Rovers in recent years has been about a club in turmoil.

But that wasn’t the case on Saturday.

What they came back to was a pleasant atmosphere.

The fans were fantastic, the atmosphere was great and the football was fantastic.

It was like we had turned back the clock to when Blackburn were in the Premier League and playing the likes of Manchester City every week.

To get a draw was a great result and it should act as a great taster for the lads.

They will have seen what it’s about, playing top teams like Manchester City again, and it would be nice for them to build on their performance and get back into the Premier League.

But to do that they are going to have to play as consistently well in the league.

That’s the big challenge facing them now.

You can get up for a game against Manchester City – massive matches like that are not a problem.

But once they’re gone, they’re gone, and the next thing you know you’re back down at the basic level needing to pick yourself up for your next league match.

The standard the boys have set themselves is high.

And now everybody knows they have the capability of doing it, they must keep doing it on a consistent basis.

It was a very nice surprise to see how they played on Saturday – it was massively improved on their last home game.

I’ve got to be honest I personally didn’t see it coming.

I thought they would and do reasonably well but if Manchester City scored within the first half hour I thought they would be overrun. But that didn’t happen.

As an underdog you have to defend tight and defend deep in a bid to frustrate.

Blackburn did that but not only that.

Offensively they impressed me in the second half because they had a little go and didn’t sit back.

It was a good sign to see Gary Bowyer throwing on two forwards in the second half.

If they can add that attacking prowess to the way that they defended during the game, then it looks promising.