True or not though, the loud boos that filled the ground during the Wolves game must have affected, even shocked Barry Kilby, as much as any player or manager who heard them, whether they were justified or not. Reasonable people felt sorry for Brian Laws, but it was one of those instances where there seemed to be no inbetween opinions. In the Claret corner were those who felt he was simply carrying the can for events that were not of his making and that the crecendo of boos was damned unfair, and in the blue corner were those who felt he was simply out of his depth, his card marked by his poor record and sacking at Sheffield Wednesday, and singly responsible for all the defeats at Burnley since his arrival. At the time it was described by many as an underwhelming appointment although much was made of his record at Wednesday of managing on a shoestring. Few, if any people, at that stage were questioning the two people who had appointed him, Barry Kilby and Brendan Flood.
Yet, it was hard not to feel downright sorry for him in several of the games since he took over. The Fletcher headed miss against Portsmouth would have changed that game. Jeff Winter in his website blog noted the penalty that should have been awarded in the Wolves game. There were the linesman’s decisions in the Fulham away game that gave them a 2 – 0 lead. The two injuries in the early minutes of the Bolton game wrecked any gameplan. Another bad Fletcher miss in the away game at Man Utd would have given the Clarets a 1 - 0 lead had he scored. Individual defending errors both in the Portsmouth and Wolves games gave those games away. A deflection off Carlisle in the Wolves game was cruel. The Thompson miss in the Arsenal game would have made it 2 – 2. Wasn’t there a game where a goal disallowed for offside should in fact have stood? The list might well be longer and all of them events beyond any manager’s control.
Discussions centred around who on earth, if this was true, could be brought in at such a late stage to rescue the Prem place – Curbishley, Coppell, Stan Ternent, Peter Reid, Ian Dowie, Megson, Phil Brown maybe, even God forbid, the forgotten man David O Leary. What was certainly agreed was that the feelgood factor and belief had clearly gone. Anticipation and optimism were at rock bottom after the Wolves game and there was huge disappointment at the way the season was ending in such a ragged way. And yet at the same time there was the desire to get behind the team and 3,500+ tickets were sold for the Wigan game.
It all turned out to be fanciful, downright ridiculous nonsense anyway and the poster/expert who claimed that it was “highly likely” slunk away with egg on his face. “This is ludicrous, irresponsible, damaging and inaccurate,” said Barry Kilby. “We are NOT in the process of looking for a replacement for Brian and everyone involved with Burnley Football Club is putting every ounce of effort into staying in the Premier League.” And if relegation did occur then the good news was that the Premier League had upped the parachute payments to a staggering £16million for the first two seasons and then £8million for the next two. It was tempting to say who cares about relegation; with that kind of money we’ll bounce straight back up anyway. But with Brian Laws, asked the cynical? Get off the bloke’s back demanded the others.
A few hundred miles away the nine-point deduction at Portsmouth was confirmed and in retaliation Avram Grant threatened to throw the final weeks of the Premiership into chaos when he announced that he would concentrate on the FA Cup and might well play weakened teams in the League. With their next game against relegation rivals Hull City it generated ripples of apprehension and anger. Previously, they had been to Burnley and playing out of their skins, won 2 – 1. Any such actions would of course have a direct bearing on the Burnley season. A friend mailed me about a spat he had with a Pompey supporter.
“I gave a Pompey supporter a hard time the other day. He was expecting me to express pleasure in their FA Cup run. I retorted ‘how could I when you were doing it by cheating. You are putting out a team you cannot afford and are now expecting the creditors, many of whom include small firms like printers, caterers and charities like the St John’s Ambulance Brigade, to take a minute cut of what they are owed, so that some other rich kid can sweep in with their largesse, freed of any commitment to meeting those financial obligations. I don’t want t see you do at all well because to do so would be under utterly false pretences. At least the club I support is prepared to live within its means and honour its financial obligations’.
As it turned out, Portsmouth beat Hull and came back from 2 – 1 down. It gave little help to Burnley. Carlisle was missing with a broken toe so in came Duff who had an excellent game. In a gutsy, give-everything performance, they were on course for a deserved point and 0 – 0 draw until Wigan scored deep into injury time. The winger skinned Jordan, crossed, and the unmarked Rodallega powered home a bullet header from outside the 6-yard box. The word heartbreaking was totally inadequate. The feeling of deflation was as deep as anything felt for weeks. Laws’ face at the end said it all. The word cruel was used to describe the manner in which Wolves won the previous week. Yet again the same word was on everyone’s lips and in every Sunday report.
Another pal emailed: The match, what can I say? I’ll start by saying that Wigan were, player for player, better than us. It’s the same almost every game. We had chances – only a couple – but chances they were. I was, for the majority of the game, engulfed in that ‘defeat feeling’. At the same time though I was feeling we were a lot more solid in defence, or maybe their finishing was woeful. God, I don’t know what I felt; it’s a numbness, a sadness, an expectancy; not a nice feeling, a bit of nausea, heart pounding in my throat. Pato skimmed the bar and Nugent just failed to connect when sent through in injury time. Seconds remaining, that defeat feeling increased. Then, a header from one of their guys and the net bulged. Their crowd erupted. It was another Pavluchenko Moment. I love the Prem but I worry I might not see it again.But I have to remain positivefor my son. If he’s to serve his time as a Burnley fan, he has to face up to times like these. It’s bloody hard though.
The only consolation on such a disastrous Saturday was the Arsenal win over West Ham, a defeat that put West Ham well and truly back into the relegation mire just three points above Burnley.
The Blackburn versus Chelsea game the day after showed one thing; that any possibility of seeing more than 30 consecutive seconds football from Blackburn was quite remote. If Stoke City receive criticism for the way they play, then Blackburn deserve worse. This was what one might call ‘bump and grind’ football; bump into any opponent as often as possible, stop them playing and grind out a result. Pretty it was not and about as beautiful to watch as manager Allerdyce’s gum-chewing face. They got the result, a 1 – 1 draw, but other than the goal it was hard to remember any other serious attempt on goal or any sequence of more than a couple of passes. But here’s the thing; it’s football that in their case has brought them enough points for another Premiership season.
With just seven games to go the Press featured many an article about who was likely for the drop. Burnley were natural favourites with the unbelievably poor away record cited over and over again. Looking back to the beginning of the season all of us hoped that although we would struggle, that it would not be a season of humiliation. Sadly, the away record was becoming exactly that. Portsmouth with their nine point deduction were certainties; West Ham had again become embroiled in the struggle along with Hull City. Of course there was still everything to play for but only unless Hull and West Ham had a final disastrous run, did Burnley have any chance of survival.
Wonder what’s going through Owen Coyle’s head, now that Tony Mowbray has left Celtic, we all asked, with a lot of us feeling a sense of smug satisfcation at the way things had worked out. The Celtic job was the one Coyle had always openly said he wanted, but after the Wembley play-off triumph, the offer of the job came for him too soon, he confessed. None of us would have minded had he stayed at Burnley longer and then taken the Celtic job as soon as it was available. It’s what we all expected to happen and we would have waved him goodbye with tremendous gratitude and affection. Had he not deserted Turf Moor for the Bolton job, he would most certainly have been offered the job following Mowbray’s departure after the humiliating 0 – 4 defeat at St Mirren on March 24th. Life works in funny ways. If he was feeling a sense of frustration and annoyance and kicking himself on hearing the news then it was the least he deserved. This was a man who displayed a total lack of any honour or principles when he left in mid-season. What goes round goes round.
A chum sent me details of the Preston North End Player of the Year Awards Evening. At Burnley it was £80 a person in the Gold area. At Preston it was an even more mind-boggling £100 per person PLUS VAT. Dear God where do people get this kind of money from these days? I thought there was a recession. You could live for a month in Bacup for less than that. Mind you at Preston there was a champagne reception with canapes in the Museum, a video, and a first-team player to sit on your table. At that price Mrs T said she’d want one to sit on her knee although not if it was Jon Parkin or Neil Mellor. No chance of seconds there either if it was them on your table and pie and chips on the menu. Parkin was player of the year in 2009 which presumably doesn’t say much for the rest of them. Catering was by ‘Heathcotes’ which I learned was a fancy restaurant and there’s one in Alderley Edge where all the millionaires live and even the council houses have gold taps. Words like sun-dried, mozzarella, ragu and rustica are liberally sprinkled over all the menus and you’re not allowed in unless you’ve been marinated. Paul Heathcote on his ‘Who Am I’ page was able to tell us he was an MBE. Can anybody be an MBE these days? What about me for writing all these Burnley books? Somebody asked me the other night had I ever been syndicated. I said no, it was just the way I walked after I’d had the operation. This is absolutely true but one of the most popular books in Walton Jail is No Nay Never Vol One. I have another chum who teaches English to Liverpudlians there and she said she took a copy in and it was passed round and eagerly read by all the Clarets. Nobody wanted the Ashley Cole book which shows that even hardened lags can be quite discerning.
And then it was THE match, Burnley versus Blackburn Rovers. Supporters said just one thing; if we go down, let’s at least beat this lot. The signs were not good. Blackburn had won the last five.
Dave Thomas March 27th 2010
