THE fact Jason Steele had to wait until almost the 70th minute to make his first save against Newcastle United last weekend demonstrated just how well Blackburn Rovers defended at St James’ Park.

Rovers restricted the league leaders, who had averaged more than two goals a game prior to facing Owen Coyle’s side, to just a handful of chances, with Steele forced in to just two saves of note.

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The goalkeeper chalked up just a second clean sheet of the season, and first on the road, as Rovers made it back-to-back league wins to move out of the bottom three.

And Steele said: “It was important. We haven’t had enough clean sheets this season, I’ll be the first to say that, but we’ve got to take a collective responsibility for that.

“It’s not just down to the centre halves and the goalkeeper, it’s about the whole team, we win and lose together.

“Don’t get me wrong there were times when we were under the cosh but I felt we thoroughly deserved the win.

“To a man I thought everyone stood up, worked really hard, and I thought we looked a threat as well and could have had more goals.

“Hopefully we can keep this little run going now.”

Steele’s first save came from a 25-yard Jonjo Shelvey strike, before he was forced to deny Ciaran Clark inside the six yard box with a smart stop low down.

And the 26-year-old added: “I don’t think I had a save to make until about the hour mark which was surprising.

“I’m not saying that I was expecting to go there and be busy, but you certainly expect to go to the top of the league and make a save before the hour mark.

“Personally that was great for me.”

Rovers clean sheet was achieved with Charlie Mulgrew and Darragh Lenihan in the middle of the back four and the pair are expected to continue that partnership against Huddersfield Town at Ewood Park on Saturday.

Mulgrew scored the only goal of the game with 15 minutes to go, with Rovers surviving a nervy six additional minutes to close out the win.

And the Scotland international says the result will have given the players plenty of confidence ahead of the Terriers clash.

He said of the Magpies victory: “It was huge. We can all talk about it but we have to go out there and do it and that’s the main thing.

“They ended with about three or four up front and they were piling the ball forward, but it was about keeping that bit of composure and defending well which I think we did.

“You can always pick things out that you could have done better, we could have done more when we had the ball, but at the end of the day it’s about the result, no-one remembers anything else.

“Newcastle are the best team in the league by far.

“They have spent a lot of money so to go there and get a result will give us a lot of confidence.

“But it’s only another three points and we have to now look to the next game which is just as important.”