Burnley v Blackburn: Quality to win out in Lan-clasico

• Plenty at stake in huge Lancashire derby
• Rovers either win or lose but never draw
• Clarets can win without conceding
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Burnley v Blackburn
Sunday 13 November, 12:30
Live on Sky Sports Football

Plenty at stake

The first 'Lan-clasico' in 6 years will decide who tops the league going into the World Cup break. That alone makes this one of the biggest ever first-half-of-the-season Championship games. Burnley won both league fixtures in the 2015-16 campaign, and head into this as strong favourites.

Frankly, it's hard to disagree with the market. Burnley are the highest scorers in the Championship this season, netting 37 goals in 20 games. A penchant for drawing games they should have won has been mostly overcome. Things are going very well under Vincent Kompany - the 'teething issues' that many predicted never came to pass.

A 45 minute blip last weekend in the 5-2 defeat at Bramall Lane in which they forgot how to defend set pieces might raise concerns for some. It's worth remembering that they were excellent in the first half, took a 2-1 lead into the break and had hit the crossbar as well. There's nothing in their previous games to suggest the set piece issue will cause problems in every single game.

Josh Brownhill returns from suspension as is as huge upgrade on Samuel Bastien. The trio of Nathan Tella, Anass Zaroury and Manuel Benson are in sparkling form and cause problems for every opposition.

Rovers in a false position

The way Blackburn's games have played out, they would almost be better off flipping a coin before kick off, accepting the result and saving themselves the hassle. 20 matches, no draws, 12 wins and 8 defeats. There's not been a single equalising goal in a Blackburn league game this season.

It's simple. Score the first goal, and they win. Concede the first goal, and they lose. As much as they have done well to win more games than they have lost, they have lost 6 of 10 away from home, all of them to nil.

Jon Dahl Tomasson is enjoying a great start to life as Blackburn Rovers. The big question is: how sustainable are these results and this league position? Time will tell, but our stance is that Rovers do not have the quality of a typical automatic promotion team.

Back the Clarets

It feels more than fair to suggest that if Burnley score the first goal, as they are expected to, they will win this game. And based on Blackburn's results to suggest that once they go behind, they struggle to get back into the game.

Backing Burnley to win to nil at 2.8 feels a good way to play this, with the straight win price just a touch too short for our liking.

Back Burnley to win to nil at 2.8

If you prefer to aim bigger, find a Betfair Bet Builder below that follows a similar theme.