There can be no dressing up this result as anything else other than the worst performance of the season, in the space of a few weeks, Saints have turned from a vibrant attacking side into one lacking organisation and confidence.
There weren't many Southampton fans shocked when the team line up was announced, there was the name that everyone expected in the side and there were also a few other changes.
But from the start it was clear that this was a side where all confidence, all motivation & all excitement has been crushed and although there were around 2,500 Saints supporters who had made the long trip, you felt that the same could be said of the Southampton fans present.
In truth to start with you could understand why Jack Stephens was in the side, after all Blackburn had just hit 5 on the road at Sunderland, so it was understandable that Russell Martin should be cautious.
But it seemed that very shortly after the start of the game the tactics changed, Jack moved into the centre of midfield and to be blunt he is not a central midfielder, Blackburn were there for the taking and we needed players in the centre who could surge forward and create chances and catch Blackburn on the back foot.
But instead for a large part of the game our play from the midfield was laboured and slow, on the bench we had Will Smallbone, good at moving the ball forward quickly and with an eye of goal, we had Shea Charles, a player who can play in several positions and has been criminally overlooked of late.
Both of them are central midfielders by trade, how did they feel to watch a central defender labour in the midfield. our attacking play was pedestrian, so many times we failed to create attacking moves as we just kept passing sideways or backwards.
Even when substitutions were made, it was not Captain Jack who made way in the midfield, it was Joe Rothwell who made way just after the hour mark for Will Smallbone, like for like yes, but surely better to have 3 midfielders who are actually midfielders.
It was not all Jack Stephens's fault, but truth was this looked a side that had lost confidence, it knew that it was not being lead by it's manager, it knew the manager was playing favourites and it knew that this was not the first time, but the culmination of 3 months of playing Stephens at any opportunity and now as we are finding out, at any cost.
I do feel sorry for Jack Stephens, over the last 7 years he has been a good squad player, a loyal servant to the club, dare I say it a fans favourite, but all that is being eroded, up at Ewood Park I did not see or hear a Saints supporter who wasn't critical of the manager of Jack Stephens.
That is a sad state of affairs, Jack should be playing his part in this promotion push and at times he has done so very well, but he, his team mates and indeed the Saints supporters know his limitations and that he not being picked on merit and this performance showed that.
But although it may not seem like it, this Verdict is more about the manager than Jack Stephens, how the hell have we changes in such a short period of time from a team that for 22 unbeaten league games, outscored and outdefended it's rivals and in doing so became firm favourites for promotion.
The answer is the manager, not just his stubborn determination to play Jack Stephens at every opportunity, but at all costs.
On Saturday we saw not only strange team selections, but strange substitutions, dare I say it but we missed the marauding play of Ryan Manning down the left wing, when it came for substitutions just about the only one you could agree with was replacing David Brooks with Che Adams, that actually was a chance to change things around, as discussed Smallbone for Rothwell was just wrong and showed the favouritism is real and not imagined when you leave a defender in midfield when you need goals.
On 75 minutes came another double change, we were looking for goals so we took off our top scorer and indeed the second top scorer in the division and brought on Sulemana and also replaced Ryan Fraser with Sam Edozie.
The problem with Adam Armstrong was not his performance but the lack of service he was getting from the midfield. Captain Jack was far from being the only culprit, but this was a team playing with fear, the fear of making a mistake and getting caught out.
Anyone who has played football will tell you, when your confidence is gone you keep it simple, that means you don't try and turn and take players on, you don't try to hit the killer ball or the shot from outside the box.
No you keep playing the way you are facing and keep playing it not only short, but also sideways and backwards, just when we needed the manager to change this he did nothing.
Then with 3 minutes left another strange one, off went Kyle Walker- Peters and on came Sekou Mara, again why take off one of the most potent attacking options we had on the day and leave a defender playing in midfield on the pitch, just when we needed to have a grand finale.
This was a team lacking in everything, the confidence has been shot, there is no discernible pattern to our play and more to the point there is no leadership from the manager.
It pains me to say this, I have stuck up for Russell Martin, when he came he talked about establishing an identity for the team, he did that and created a team that appeared to be heading for automatic promotion, yet after doing that he tore it all apart.
The problem now is that having gone along this path and in the face of mounting criticism from the Saints supporters, can he admit he is wrong, by showing he sees what we all see and back down, I would say that would be very difficult for any manager, they have to stick to their guns and not bow down to pressure, even when it is justified.
So it is going to be very interesting to see what happens against Coventry on Tuesday, can the manager turn things round in the dressing room.
Picking a man of the match is difficult, but there was one clear winner, Gavin Bazunu had little to do during the game apart from needing to act smartly as his defenders put him in trouble with a series of tight back passes, but in the second half he made a couple of smart stops to make sure that like Ipswich we didn't snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.