Match Preview: Brighton v Burnley

One point from two home games isn’t exactly a good start to the Graham Potter era, especially given the opponents were West Ham United and Southampton.

Okay, so the football has been entertaining and the performances good. And there were mitigating circumstances as to why we didn’t win those matches – West Ham due to a combination of VAR and the brilliance of Lukasz Fabianski, Southampton because Florin Andone is an idiot.

But those results have put a little bit of pressure on the Albion to get something against Burnley, especially as after the Clarets, the next visitors to the Amex will be Tottenham Hotspur.

Lose to Sean Dyche’s men and Harry Kane and co and it will be one point from a possible 12 at home. Suddenly, the voices of those who felt Chris Hughton shouldn’t have been sacked will become a lot louder.

A brief history of Burnley
Burnley were one of the founder members of the Football League in 1888 and have twice been crowed champions of England in 1921 and 1960. The swinging 60s turned out to be a golden era at Turf Moor. The Clarets advanced all the way to the quarter finals of the European Cup a year after their title win and reached the FA Cup Final in 1962 as well as finishing runners up in the league to Ipswich Town.

By the time the 1980s rolled around, Burnley were set into a deep decline and they entered the final day of the 1986-87 season needing a result against Leyton Orient to avoid relegation into the Conference. Had they lost and dropped into non-league, they probably would have folded. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

A 2–1 win coupled with a loss for Lincoln City ensured that it was the Imps who went down instead. From that lowest ebb, Burnley recovered and they are currently enjoying their third spell in the Premier League. What’s impressive about that is each time they’ve secured promotion, they’ve done it with squads who have cost a fraction of what most teams spend to get out of the Championship.

They may be unfashionable, but the way that Burnley as a club operate is a model that other teams could do a lot worse than replicating.

Burnley last season
It was a case of after the Lord Mayor’s show for the Clarets. In 2017-18, they stunned everyone by finishing as ‘Best of the Rest’ which brought European to Burnley last season. Many pundits felt that their small squad would struggle to cope with the demands of the Europa League and although they only lasted a couple of qualifying rounds into the competition, there’s no doubt that it had a detrimental impact on their overall form.

As a result, Dyche and his players spent most of the campaign embroiled in the relegation battle before pulling away to finish 15th, six points clear of Cardiff City. The word around Turf Moor is that the Clarets look to be back to their hard-to-beat best so far this season after going through the motions in the first half of the previous campaign, which makes them difficult opponents for most Premier League sides.

Head-to-head
Meetings between Brighton and Burnley were few and far between until 20 years ago, since when we’ve met with increasing frequency in the top two divisions. The head-to-head is actually pretty even with Brighton recording 10 wins, Burnley 11 and 12 draws from 33 previous encounters.

As you can probably tell from the draw count, these games tend to be close-run things. Before the Clarets’ 3-1 win at the Amex in February, nine of the previous 15 games had ended level. Of the six that didn’t, four finished 1-0.

Only Oscar Garcia’s first home victory – a 2-0 win in August 2013 – and that famous afternoon at Turf Moor when Craig Mackail-Smith scored a bicycle kick as Brighton won 3-1 had featured a winning margin greater than one goal.

Brighton’s head-to-head record with Burnley

Last six meetings
• Brighton 1-3 Burnley (Premier League, 09/02/19)
• Burnley 1-0 Brighton (Premier League, 08/12/18)
• Burnley 0-0 Brighton (Premier League, 28/04/18)
• Brighton 0-0 Burnley (Premier League, 16/12/17)
• Brighton 2-2 Burnley (Championship, 06/04/16)
• Burnley 1-1 Brighton (Championship, 22/11/15)

While the games tend to be pretty close, it’s certainly Burnley who have enjoyed the fixture more over the past few years. Last season’s double extended their unbeaten record against the Albion to eight games stretching right back to that aforementioned first triumph for Oscar, delivered by goal from Andrew Crofts and David Lopez.

Team news
Potter confirmed in his pre-match press conference that Leandro Trossard will be out until mid-October with a groin problem. Having packed Jurgen Locadia off to Germany, Florin Andone off to Turkey and Anthony Knockaert to Fulham, that does on the face of it leave us looking very light in attack.

But delve a little deeper and there are still plenty of options for Potter to use. Glenn Murray could come in through the middle with Neal Maupay going a little wider. Pascal Gross provides a straight swap option, Potter clearly rates Aaron Connolly extremely highly and Alireza Jahnabakhsh apparently deserves a chance because he got an assist for Iran against the might of Hong Kong on Tuesday night. Aaron Mooy could possibly even play there.

If we were in Potter’s shoes, we’d go for Gross. He got an assist away at Watford and created more chances than anyone else in the draw with West Ham, which made Potter dropping him for Andone against Southampton seem particularly harsh. Whoever plays will have big boots to fill though as Trossard has easily been our best player going forward so far.

The other intriguing selection decision will come at the other end. Potter justified replacing Shane Duffy with Adam Webster as a “tactical decision” against Manchester City. Some took the view that it was actually the latest manoeuvre designed to remove those players with apparent questionable attitudes from the side.

Knockaert and his petulance have gone. Locadia and his laziness. Andone and his anger issues. Has Duffy paid the price for liking his nights out a little too much? Should Webster hold onto his spot, that could be telling.

Burnley’s key players
Number niiiinnnnneeeeee Ashley Barnes. He’s actually number 10 for Burnley and he’s started the Premier League season in blistering form to the point where there were calls from some quarters for him to receive an England call up. It’s all a far cry from when he was tripping over referees away at Bolton Wanderers all those years ago. And in the unlikely event that Barnes fails to score, then Chris Wood probably will.

A good WeAreBrighton.com memory of Burnley at home
For younger Brighton fans, Steve Sidwell is best remembered for scoring from the halfway line against Bristol City and having a song which encouraged extramarital relations. For veterans of the early Withdean days, then arguably Sidwell’s best moment in an Albion shirt came when he scored two goals in the final 90 seconds to rescue a 2-2 draw against Burnley in December 2002.

A bad WeAreBrighton.com memory of Burnley at home
In terms of result, last season’s was about as bad as it gets. Losing 3-1 at home to a relegation rival with all the goals being scored by your former players was a chastening experience. But it seems to go forgotten that the performance wasn’t actually that bad. Tom Heaton in the Burnley goal gave the best individual show of goalkeeping we’d seen since, er, Ben Foster the week before. Had we have won that day – as we deserved to – then things might have been very different. It was that defeat that seemed to ingrain in Chris Hughton the believe that we weren’t going to win games by attacking, which resulted in the absolute dirge that was served up for the final three months of the campaign.

Our favourite player to play for Brighton and Burnley
A ridiculous number of strikers have played for both clubs down the years. It’s fair to say that Barnes and Wood were never properly appreciated during their time with the Albion and then you have the likes of Sam Vokes, Gifton Noel-Williams and Ade Akinbiyi.

Our favourite though? No no, no no no no, no no no no, no no no no NOGAN. Kurt Nogan looked pretty ropy when he first arrived at the Goldstone. He then turned into an absolute machine, scoring 40 times in 70 odd appearances, before another long goalless streak preceded his sale to Burnley in 1995.

He finished with a record of 49 goals from 97 games, which stands up to the averages of some of the best strikers Brighton have ever had. A criminally underrated player, especially given the fact that he was playing throughout the struggles of the mid-90s.

What do we like about Burnley?
There’s some pretty good pubs in Burnley and it was the first place we ever came across the culinary delight that is a doner kebab pizza. On the negative side, the locals have previously elected BNP councillors and you shouldn’t need reminding of the reception that Gaetan Bong receives for having the nerve to report his belief that Jay Rodriquez had racially abused him.

Prediction
Burnley will be well organised and hard to beat and in Barnes and Wood, they have two forwards who know where the goal is. It won’t be easy, but Brighton just to squeak home 2-1. Please.