GRAEME SOUNESS ended his press conference with a heavy sigh.

"Every day is an obstacle course at the moment," groaned the Ewood gaffer who, after four frustrating results now has what seems a never ending injury crisis to deal with.

Rovers are desperate for their first home win of the Premier League season against Leeds tomorrow but Souness knows he faces an uphill battle if he is to lift some of the current gloom around Ewood.

"I believe as long as we keep playing our football we will be fine but we are under no illusions that we play a tough team.

"It will be a difficult game for us, given that we will have three or four of our top men not playing.

"We are going into the Leeds game with a depleted squad but I am sure whoever plays will do their very best."

Souness, as is well documented, will be without Matt Jansen, Damien Duff, Stig Bjornebye and Andy Cole while Dwight Yorke and David Thompson are major doubts leaving the manager with a real headache.

"We are a club where I believe we have 10 or 11 very good players who can play in the Premier League.

"Outside of that we don't have great strength in depth. Unfortunately for us we have got injuries to some of our top men all at the same time.

"I always find that teams that qualify for the Champions League on a regular basis earn that much cash that they can have big squads.

"That is how the game is engineered and developed. This helps them when they have a crisis.

"We are like the majority of other teams, we don't have that luxury."

He continued: "But we believe we are doing the correct things this season and with the arrival of Dwight Yorke and David Thompson we are a better team than we were last year.

"So I expect us to be better than last year, we finished tenth and I would like to think with these two addtions we should do better than that.

"But football is strange."

And how strange it has been for Souness in recent weeks after a good start.

The shock 1-0 loss to Middesbrough, where Rovers dominated play, was followed by the late defeat to Chelsea.

Then Rovers threw away a two-goal lead at Manchester City to draw 2-2 followed by the midweek 1-1 draw with CSKA Sofia in the UEFA Cup - a team they were hot favourites to beat.

Rovers desperately need a win to get them back in the groove but in-form Leeds present a big hurdle.

"Terry Venables will be the first man to tell you that he has inherited a fantastic set of players," said Souness.

"They will see themselves as potential champions, they should do because they have got strength in depth in most positions.

"Leeds is an important game but they all are including the two after, away to West Brom and at home to Tottenham."

Leeds skipper Dominic Matteo could again be sidelined for the Ewood Park clash.

Centre-back Matteo missed United's Thursday night UEFA Cup first-round, first-leg 1-0 victory over Ukrainian side Metalurg Zaporizhya with a recurrence of a knee injury.

The Scotland international did light running work in today's training session, but there is no guarantee he will be fit tomorrow.

Midfielder Nick Barmby, who also sat out the European match, is again doubtful with his back problem.