Tony Mowbray remains bullish about Rovers’ credentials this season and has no qualms about being judged against his ambitions for the club.

Mowbray wants to avoid being a manager ‘who clogs around in the middle of the Championship’ having set his sights on the top six at the start of the season.

Rovers stabilised following promotion last season, finishing 15th with 60 points, but the manager set loftier targets this time around.

However, Mowbray’s side find themselves 17th heading in to tomorrow’s game with Sheffield Wednesday, without a win in six and reeling from throwing away a 2-0 lead at Preston North End last weekend.

But retaining full confidence in his side, Mowbray told the Lancashire Telegraph: “I think it’s the right thing to do to raise ambition.

“We have to try and get this club back to the Premier League. That has to be the ambition of the club, that’s my only ambition.

“When I go to India to see the owners, that’s what I tell them. It might not happen today, or tomorrow, but we have to have the ambition and look for the incremental improvements.

“Is it right to raise ambition? Of course. To be honest, I don’t want to be a manager who clogs around in the middle of the Championship.

“I have talked a lot about my family, I’m a family man, I’ve got kids who want to play football in the garden with their dad.

“I don’t want to spend my life being mid-table every year. I love football with a passion, I love footballers, I want them to strive and get to the Premier League.

“I want them to play at the best grounds, in front of the biggest crowds, and feel what football at the top level is all about.

“I want to try and manage there as well sometime soon. The sooner it happens, that’s what I try and push hard and mentally, the barriers that are put in front of people, climb over them.

“I want them to believe they push towards the top six of this league. If they don’t believe it then they have no chance.

“By trying to raise their expectation as footballers we should beat Luton at home, we should beat Charlton at home, we should beat Sheffield Wednesday at home in my opinion.

“Is it right to send the players out and tell the fans that’s what our aim is? I think so. If we feel short, then that’s okay, I’m just a guy doing a job.”

Mowbray pointed to the rise of Aston Villa last season, from mid-table for much of the campaign to play-off winners in May, as an example of how a team can break from the pack.

And he remains confident his squad have that potential, despite being in the midst of a tough run of form.

He added: “I still sit here pretty strongly thinking that Gallagher will bang them in every week, Armstrong will keep scoring, Dack gets his goals, we go back to finding a way of keeping clean sheets like we did early season, what can stop us?

“This team is more than capable of winning games back-to-back. We just have to keep going until we hit that vein of form.

“I think this league is so open, I don’t see many top, top teams. Aston Villa were 16th this time last year, and got up via the play-offs. Is the league better or worse than last year? I think it’s closer, tighter, teams are similar.

“It’s about us trying to find a bit of form, a bit of confidence, get a run together, win five or six on the bounce, it can easily be done.”