FIGHT fan Craig Conway believes Blackburn Rovers can deliver a Boxing Day blow to Championship leaders Middlesbrough.

Boro ensured they will be top of the tree for Christmas after they ended title rivals Brighton & Hove Albion’s 21-game unbeaten start to the season on Saturday.

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The stunning 3-0 Amex success extended Aitor Karanka’s team’s unbeaten league run to six matches ahead of the trip to Ewood Park.

The following afternoon Rovers suffered the first defeat of Paul Lambert’s reign and their first in nine games when they lost 1-0 at Reading.

But in-form Conway insists they can bounce back against a Boro side who have not conceded a league goal in nearly 10 hours of football.

“It’s been a great start, it was five games unbeaten, but at the end of the day it couldn’t last forever,” said the winger, who regularly works out in the boxing ring.

“We’ve got to jump back on it. We’ve got Middlesbrough at home on Boxing Day and that’s going to be tough but we’re more than capable of winning it.

“Any game is tough in this league but at home we fancy ourselves against anyone. It will be a tough game, they’re top of the league and one of the favourites for promotion, but we fancy our chances and hopefully we can get a result.”

Middlesbrough have kept six consecutive Championship clean sheets and a league best 13 from the 22 matches they have played so far this season.

Against such miserly opponents Conway knows Rovers can ill-afford to be as profligate as they were in the reverse to Reading when strikers Fode Koita and Jordan Rhodes missed chances.

He said: “We had a header early on from big Fode (Koita), he probably should have scored and I thought we were on top at that time, but that changed the course of the game. We just had to keep going, but the goal didn’t come.

“You’ve got to take your chances. We didn’t, but we played well. There were a lot of positives, especially in the first half.

“In the Championship the games come thick and fast so we’ve just got to get on with it in time for Boxing Day.

“We’ve been on an unbeaten run and won three of the previous five so it’s just a case of keep going.”