GRAEME Souness was thankful for a second half transformation that rescued a point in the Premiership opener with West Bromwich Albion on Saturday.

The Rovers boss made a double substitution to change the course of the game at half-time, when Rovers were trailing to Neil Clement's shock strike in the 34th minute.

But with Blackburn hot favourites to kick off their season with three points against new boys Albion, Souness admitted he was happy to settle for just the one.

"My overall my feeling is I'm glad to get something out of the game because they are a resolute team and it was a difficult afternoon for us," said Souness.

"They sat in and didn't make any real attempt to get forward in numbers. We had a few of those games at home last year and I was thinking it was going to be their day.

"It's never black and white with teams that have come up to the Premiership because it wasn't difficult against Wolves this time last year.

"If we'd scored the first goal maybe they would have stepped it up a bit more and made it a more entertaining game all round.

"But their game plan was to nick something from a set piece and that's exactly what happened, you couldn't have written it any better for them. That's how they worked it and they got the break.

"The first half was a typical first day of the season match, people feeling their way. They weren't a threat, we weren't a threat and I think with their only shot of the 90 minutes they got a large chunk of luck and a large deflection and it ended up in the back of our net.

"From our point of view it was a poor goal so we can criticise that and talk about that next week.

"It went through our wall so we'll have to look at that because it's not good defending."

Souness replaced Javier De Pedro and Vratislav Gresko with Tugay and Paul Dickov, who helped to liven up Blackburn's attack after the break.

They eventually got back into the game thanks to Craig Short's stooping header with 20 minutes to go, so the manager was pleased with the second half fightback despite it not yielding a victory.

"In the second half we were a different team," added Souness."We stepped up a gear and a yard of pace and we never gave up the ghost.

"We got the goal which we thoroughly deserved for our second half performance and maybe on another day we get another break and we win the game.

"So I think it was a pleasing afternoon for us. We were at home and we had to chase the game, which is what we did after half-time."

Souness also praised his stalwart Short, who bravely threw himself at Jonathan Stead's cross to steer in Rovers' first goal of the season.

"If there's one person you want in that position it's him, said the Rovers boss.

"It was a ball he could have got hurt going for but there's no way he's going to pull out of it.

"He's an old warrior and they don't make them like that any more unfortunately."