Cameron: Friedel was in the dark over save

Oct 8 2007 By Colin Tattum, Birmingham Mail

EWOOD Park fell silent when Cameron Jerome, clean through, sent a shot yards wide of goal with only Brad Friedel to beat.

It was as if nobody could believe what they saw - and they were right.

All was not as it seems, as Jerome explained: "The keeper saved it, to be fair. I shot across him and he didn't know anything about it.

"It hit his shoulder and went the other way, to the near post. I thought I was offside or something because there was no corner.

"I asked the referee at half-time and he apologised and said he got it wrong.

"If I had stuck that one away it would have been a different game. It would have been 1-1 and we would have got a big boost."

Jerome did notch, in the 68th minute, with a powerful half-volley that generated a grandstand finish.

Blues brought on Garry O'Connor, Wilson Palacios and Neil Danns, putting the accent firmly on attack as Fabrice Muamba and Mehdi Nafti gave way.

Had Blues manager Steve Bruce started in such a vein, he could have left the team too exposed against a Blackburn Rovers side that has plenty of quality and potency.

"It's really difficult to get the tactics right," said Jerome, talking about the balancing act between discipline and gung ho. "When we were 2-0 down, we had nothing to lose.

"The gaffer threw a few more attacking options in there, some fresh face, fresh legs and we got at them a bit more," he added.

"We gave ourselves a little bit of a chance, but we couldn't quite pull it back. Trying to get from 2-0, we gave ourselves too much to do really," Jerome added.