Grabbi's goal keeps hopes alive for weakened Rovers

The several hundred Bulgarian supporters who celebrated as though they had won the Uefa Cup last night clearly do not know what constitutes a decent result in Europe against Blackburn.

Corrado Grabbi's first half goal made this the first time in four European campaigns that Rovers have not begun with a 1-0 home defeat. Progress of a sort, but whether it will be enough to open the way to the second round when the teams met in Sofia in two weeks' time is, on this showing, another matter entirely.

"We can do a lot better," said Rovers' manager Graeme Souness, who has made it clear that he regards this competition as trailing far behind Premiership survival in his order of priorities. "Who's to say we can't go there and win? It was no secret that I wasn't going to play our strongest team tonight, but I still thought we were going to win the game and we should have done."

Blackburn played the last 15 minutes against 10 men after CSKA had Alexandre Tomovski sent off for his second bookable offence. "Their game plan at that stage was to sit back, so it didn't affect them too badly,'' said Souness. The irony, however, was that on their first-half showing the Bulgarians could have won this match if they had continued to go forward.

Instead, time wasting accounted for a good proportion of the yellow cards they gathered as they concentrated on frustrating Rovers.

When they were going for it, CSKA certainly looked capable of embarrassing a below-strength Blackburn side that was further weakened when Dwight Yorke went off with a hamstring strain after only 11 minutes.

When they took the lead, midway through the half, the ghosts of Trelleborg, the Swedish part-timers who famously beat them eight years ago, stalked the ground ominously. The goal was scored by Velizar Dimitrov, who collected an angled ball from Tomovski, held off the challenge of Rovers' debutant Neil Danns and beat Brad Friedel as he cut in from the left.

However the lead lasted only four minutes. Nils-Eric Johansson pulled the ball across from the left and an attempted clearance only served it up neatly for Grabbi, who scored off the inside of the far post.

Blackburn were fortunate not to go behind again immediately after, when Andy Todd ­ another player making his debut ­ was caught in possession by South African striker MacDonald Mukasi, who forced a good save from Friedel.

Although Keith Gillespie was busy in the second half, Blackburn could develop little momentum and the nearest they came to a winner was when Lucas Neill's header was palmed over.

Despite appearances to the contrary, Souness, who once scored a European Cup hat-trick against CSKA for Liverpool, insists that Blackburn have aspirations in the Uefa Cup. "We want to go as far as we can in the competition," he said. That might only be Sofia, although a stronger Blackburn line-up could have different ideas.

Blackburn Rovers (4-4-2): Friedel; Neill, Taylor, Todd, Johansson; Danns (Berg, 70), Tugay, Dunn, Hignett; Grabbi (Ostenstad, 61), Yorke (Gillespie, 11). Substitutes not used: Mahon, Curtis, Douglas, Kelly (gk).

CSKA Sofia (5-4-1): Petrov; Georgiev, Gueye, G Ivanov, Varbanov, Tomovski; Brito (Gargorov, 70), Stefanov, Yanchev, Dimitrov (Pavlov, 80); Mukasi (Sakiri, 90). Substitutes not used: Yanev, Metodi, Zlatinov, I Ivanov (gk).

Referee: B Coué (France).