BLACKBURN Rovers' two Academy sides slipped straight back into the groove with a couple of thumping victories over Sheffield Wednesday at the weekend.

After both sides suffered their first defeats of the season last week, the pressure was on to get straight back to winning ways.

But both teams rose to the challenge magnificently as they helped themselves to an astonishing 13 goals between them against the beleaguered Owls.

Rob Kelly's Under 19s somehow conspired to throw away a 3-0 lead before their superior class finally shone through as they ran out eventual 6-3 winners.

But that performance was eclipsed by Ian Miller's Under 17s who cruised to a thumping 7-0 victory to maintain their own impressive start to the campaign.

"Your aim is to go through the season as well as you can but both sides got caught cold last week, so this was a test as to how the players would bounce back and they showed a lot of character to do that," said Kelly.

The first half of the Under 19s game was almost a carbon copy of the first team's clash in Sofia last week as Rovers roared into a 3-0 lead only to be pegged back to 3-3.

But three goals without reply in the second half saw the home side take command as Rovers ran out comfortable winners in the end with Paul Gallagher (2), Ciaran Donnelly, Adam Nelson, Alex Bruce and Jerome Watt the players on target.

"We were terrific going forward but then had a mad 15 minutes at the back," said Kelly, in reference to the Under 19 result.

"I think we became a little bit complacent and then started thinking about how many we were going to score.

"So we were a bit naive defensively but in the end it was another good performance and a great result."

Several schoolboys took the chance to shine for the Under 17s in their 7-0 romp.

Joe Garner (2), Omar Abdilah and Keith Barker all found the net together with first year scholars Luke Humphreys, Peter Corvino and Tareck Sakari.