HE may have been brought up on the other side of the Pennines, watching a different Rovers, but there are no doubts where Mark Atkins’ loyalties lie now.

That much was clear last week when the proud grandad shared a picture on Twitter of his beaming grandson wearing a Blackburn Rovers baby grow.

Atkins captioned the adorable snap, ‘Never too early to get the grandson supporting @Rovers’. It was swiftly retweeted and liked many times over.

Unsurprisingly, really, given key the role the former midfielder played in the club’s promotion to the top flight and famous Premiership title win three years later.

It distresses Atkins, then, that Rovers are facing a fight to avoid being relegated to the third tier of English football for the first time since 1979.

And, like so many of the club’s supporters, he is unsure what the future holds under the club’s owners Venky’s.

What he does think, though, is that, for now at least, Rovers must view survival as success this season given the lack of transfer funds provided to manager Owen Coyle.

Atkins believes the strikers Coyle has signed should have enough goals in them to keep the club out of the bottom three come May.

But he insists if the intention of Venky’s is to remain in control of Rovers they must start to speculate or risk the club falling further adrift.

“The last four games they have got a couple of wins which has got them up the table a little bit and in a slight better position than what they were, but I don’t think anybody will be pleased with the start they’ve made,” said Doncaster-born Atkins, who grew up supporting his hometown team.

“With the situation they’re in I think it’s going to be a dogfight all season. I don’t think they can look any further than staying in the Championship for now given the start they’ve had and how things have gone over the last year or so with Paul Lambert leaving in the circumstances he did.

“It’s been a very difficult job for Owen Coyle to come in and get the players he wanted in on the money that was given to him by the owners.

“I think he’s done a good job bringing the players in he has, but now it’s a case of seeing if he can strengthen in January a bit to get the two or three more players I think they need.

“I was at the Birmingham City game last Saturday and up until Danny Graham and Marvin Emnes went off I thought they were very good and they looked like they could go on to win the game.

“But when they went off, or even when they got injured, because you could see they were both injured, the game deteriorated massively and very quickly, which was disappointing.

“A lot of the time as a football manager you live and die by your forwards. If you’ve got good forwards who can score a goal you can get away with mistakes.

“When Owen took over there were no forwards at the club. He’s had to get them in, whatever way possible, and I think he’s got some good forwards.

“I was very impressed with Emnes and Graham at Birmingham, they look like they could form a good combination, and if they keep them fit they’ve got a chance.

“But there are other areas on the pitch that need looking at and, if he gets a bit of money in January, I think Owen will go and strengthen.”

Atkins knows all about one key area he feels Coyle desperately needs to bolster.

“You look at the midfield and they are all a much of a muchness,” said the 48-year-old, who scored 39 goals in 314 appearances for Rovers, including six in the 1995 championship-winning campaign.

“They all pretty much play the same way. Sometimes you need to mix it up with that box-to-box midfielder who gets in the area every other time a cross comes in.

“That doesn’t seem to be there at the minute. but if Owen could get someone like that, who can go and play alongside the other lads, it will be a good mix.”

But to do that Venky’s will have to loosen the purse strings after selling more than £10m of talent in the summer and reinvesting just £250,000.

“Blackburn are a club that should be in the Premier League or challenging at the top of the Championship so to see them down there at the bottom, looking like they could slip into League One, is worrying,” said Atkins, who was part of the BBC Radio Lancashire commentary team at Birmingham.

“In my first two seasons at the club we were in the play-offs. It was only that one season under Don Mackay when we struggled before he lost his job and we got promoted under Kenny Dalglish.

“The club, as long as I’ve known it, has been challenging or been competitive in the Premier League or in the league below, so it’s very disappointing to see them down there. Hopefully things will change in the next few months.

“The Championship has always been a hard league to get out but it’s even harder now because the teams that are coming down have got a lot of money. It’s difficult to get promoted out of it without investment.

“Unfortunately I don’t see the owners putting that investment in place. Yes they are keeping the club running but they’ve got to make the decision whether they want to be owners of a football club or they want to be owners of a good football cub that is challenging.

“You only have to look at Huddersfield Town. They’ve got a good squad together, got a new manager who has brought fresh ideas, and everyone has got behind it.

“But they’ve also spent a bit of money. To keep going at this level you do have to spend some money. You can’t keep on relying on loans and free transfers because you’re gambling on things working out.

“Some money has to be spent sooner or later.”