GARY Bowyer will not stop David Raya from playing the ball out from the back – but he wants his talented teenage goalkeeper to learn from the first major mistake of his Blackburn Rovers career.

Raya gifted Cardiff City the opening goal in Tuesday’s 1-1 Ewood Park draw when, instead of playing a simple square ball to Shane Duffy, he elected to play a risky chipped pass to Tommy Spurr.

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The 19-year-old’s blushes were spared when captain Grant Hanley volleyed in an 88th-minute equaliser.

But Rovers boss Bowyer has told the supremely confident Raya that he must use the experience wisely.

“Unfortunately when a goalkeeper makes a mistake it does tend to get highlighted a lot more than, say, a striker missing a chance or a midfielder misplacing a pass,” said Bowyer, who has placed his faith in the highly rated Spanish stopper ahead of Jason Steele and Simon Eastwood.

“He knows that, that’s the position he’s chosen to play, and he will be better for the experience – as long as he learns.

“He will get support from the staff here and we will go through the video to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

“He’s good with his feet but if you look at the decision he chose, there was another option that was far less risky.

“But he has the ability to be consistent with his feet, and it’s a major part of his game, so you wouldn’t want to be necessarily taking that away from him.

“He’s a young goalkeeper learning his trade but he needs to learn quickly now because he’s in with the big boys.

“But, potentially, this lad can go a long, long way.”

Bowyer has asked Raya and his defenders to bring the ball out of defence more this season.

But Rovers enjoyed their most success against Cardiff when they threw balls into the box.

“We mixed the game up well on Tuesday,” said Bowyer, whose side’s search for a first win of the campaign today takes them to Brighton & Hove Albion, one of his tips for promotion.

“We showed some good patience when we kept the ball and then we were trying to hurt the opposition with our pace and power as well.

“And we were very dangerous from set-plays, and not just Tommy Spurr’s long throws, but our corners and free kicks too.

“That’s probably the most impressive we have been from set-plays and in this division you need to be, as over a third of the goals scored by teams come from set-plays.”

Left-back Spurr, who was recalled in place of reigning player of the year Markus Olsson, surprisingly took over some of the free-kick duties.

“When Tommy was out of the team at the beginning of the season we were practising defending set-plays and he was taking them and his delivery was fantastic,” said Bowyer.

“He got himself back into the team and it was no-brainer to put him on them because the quality of his left foot.

“And it’s probably something that we’ve not really had in the team from a set-play delivery.

“We rely heavily on Craig Conway and Ben Marshall so it’s a bonus to have Tommy too, especially having lost Tom Cairney.”