BLACKBURN Rovers boss Gary Bowyer cut a delighted figure after his battling side ended their 10-game winless away league run with a hard-fought 2-1 victory at Sheffield Wednesday tonight.

Owls nemesis Jordan Rhodes put Rovers in front in the 17th minute with his 13th goal of the season and his seventh in his last four visits to Hillsborough.

And they doubled their advantage nine minutes later when Adam Henley made a mockery of the poor pitch by putting the finishing touch to a flowing team move to score the first goal of his career.

Rovers were denied the chance to go further in front in the 52nd minute when referee Eddie Ilderton failed to spot a clear foul on Chris Taylor in the box.

And nine minutes later Wednesday, chasing their third successive success, reduced the deficit through Chris Maguire after Jason Steele made a stunning save to keep his initial effort out.

From then on Rovers were pegged back in their own half but, thanks in part to superb performances from stand-in skipper Matt Kilgallon and debutant Doneil Henry, they kept the Owls at bay to record a win that moved them up to 10th in the Championship and within 13 points of the play-offs.

Bowyer, who made five changes ahead of Sunday’s FA Cup quarter-final clash at Liverpool, said: “I thought we were terrific first half and showed great bravery to play on a pitch that was very difficult to play on.

“We played at the right times and I felt we were worthy to go in 2-0 up at half-time.

“We scored a good first goal, from Tommy Spurr’s long throw. Browny (Chris Brown) did ever so well to win it and it was a fantastic finish from Jordan.

“Then the second goal was a great team goal and another fantastic finish, this time from Adam Henley. It’s official now, he scores goals. He’s been doing it in training and (assistant manager) Terry McPhillips has been saying he scores goals, so there you have it.

“We never used the pitch as an excuse. We trained on a pitch yesterday that wasn’t very good, in preparation, so we were never going to come here and use it as an excuse. We didn’t and that goal epitomised that.

“Even in the first half we thought we should have had a penalty and, I’ve seen it again, we should have had a stonewall penalty on Chris Taylor in second half.

“They then scored but it was a fantastic effort from our lads. There were rebounds and ricochets and finally the last one dropped to Maguire. From then on it was game on because their crowd got behind them.

“But what you saw then from our players was a fantastic resilience, character and attitude.”

Man-of-the-match Kilgallon, who Bowyer hailed as ‘magnificent’, and his centre-back partner Henry embodied that resilience.

Henry, a 21-year-old Canada international signed on a month’s loan from West Ham United, only became aware he was on his way to Rovers at midday.

After initially getting on the wrong train, he met Bowyer for the first time at the team hotel at 4pm before meeting Kilgallon and his other new-mates at 4.30pm.

Bowyer said: “He’s a 21-year-old kid and, although we’ve not known him long, you can tell he’s a fantastic lad.

“We spoke to him on the phone this morning and he couldn’t wait to come in and the measure of the lad is he jumped on a train from London and got into Sheffield at 4pm.

“And what a debut, an incredible debut against a tough cookie in Atdhe Nuhiu.”

Owls boss Stuart Gray, whose side beat table-topping Middlesbrough 2-0 at home on Saturday, said: “You can’t gift a team a two-goal start in the Championship, you’ve got to get the first goal.

“We didn't play at the intensity that we did last Saturday and we couldn't handle the big boy (Brown) up front, he was too physically strong for us.”