Clarets face the cameras

Last updated : 30 September 2005 By Tony Scholes
Joleon Lescott
Since Glenn Hoddle took over as manager last December they have only lost three times with two of those defeats coming this season, one at home and one away, to Millwall and Leeds respectively.

They are currently fourth in the table but again they have drawn perhaps too many games, as they did last season when they drew 21 of their league games. If they had won just four of those draws they would have made the play offs but in the end finished ninth after spending a lot of the season in the bottom half.

Hoddle has made just three additions to his squad since the end of last season and two of them are currently out of the side through injury. Rohan Ricketts, who had impressed in a loan spell from Spurs last time out, was brought in on a free transfer before the new season got underway as was Jackie McNamara who made a somewhat controversial departure from Celtic when it looked as though he would sign a new contract with the SPL club.

Since the season got underway sick note himself, Darren Anderton, has been signed on a free transfer from Birmingham. He played four games before being forced off with injury and has since missed the last four games although the 33 year-old is now close to reaching 400 league games.

To add to those three additions Hoddle has also brought in two players on loan. Hungarian central defender Gabor Gyepes has signed on a long term deal from Ferencvaros whilst Aston Villa goalkeeper Stefan Postma is providing cover for first choice Michael Oakes.

Wolves have hit the net seventeen times this season in their league games and striker Carl Cort has hit over half of them and will be the danger man tonight. He’s the league’s leading scorer, and hit two on Tuesday night as did his partner Kenny Miller in the 4-0 win over Crewe.

Click HERE to see all Wolves’ results this season.

Team News

Cort picked up a knee injury at Crewe and was substituted whilst Colin Cameron, often a player in top form against the Clarets, was withdrawn to avoid him suffering fatigue. Both of them though are fully fit and will line up in the Wolves side tonight.

With McNamara, Anderton and Paul Ince all still ruled out, manager Hoddle has already said it will be same again following that big win at Dario G’s place.

That means Wolves will line up:

Michael Oakes, Rob Edwards, Joleon Lescott, Gabor Gyepes, Lee Naylor, Colin Cameron, Mark Kennedy, Rohan Ricketts, Kenny Miller, Seol, Carl Cort. Subs: Stefan Postma, Jody Craddock, Mark Davies, Seyi Olofinjana, Leon Clarke.

Click HERE to see the full Wolves squad.

If Wolves go into the game unchanged then their manager Glenn Hoddle has insured that Burnley don’t with the news that he will not allow his central defender Keith Lowe to play against them.

To be fair that can come as no surprise but with both John McGreal (ruled out on Tuesday) and Frank Sinclair both struggling it could not have come at a worse time. Latest suggestions are that Frank will play although John could miss out and that would mean Michael Duff moving into the centre of defence and Micah Hyde playing at right back, as he did so well at Watford.

The big question then would be who would replace Hyde in the midfield. We could bring in either Chris McCann or Wade Elliott or revert to 4-4-2 and bring Gifton Noel-Williams back into the starting line up. I would suspect Elliott will get the nod.

If so, and if the injury situation is how it seems to be then our team will look something like: Brian Jensen, Micah Hyde, Michael Duff, Frank Sinclair, Jon Harley, Wade Elliott, Garreth O’Connor, James O’Connor, John Spicer, Graham Branch, Ade Akinbiyi. Subs: Duane Courtney, Chris McCann, Karl Bermingham, Kyle Lafferty, Gifton Noel-Williams.

Last Time

This was not the best of performances from the Burnley side last season, in fact it was probably one of the worst. Wolves didn’t play well but we didn’t do enough at any point in the game to cause them any problems.

In a 4-5-1 system that saw Jean-Louis Valois as the lone striker, as Ade Akinbiyi completed his suspension, we struggled throughout and were probably thankful the home side were nowhere near their best and in the end were relieved to only lose it 2-0 with the goals coming from Miller and Ince.

Things were made worse when John McGreal was sent off for a second yellow card in stoppage time, I suppose overall just a typical ninety minutes at Molineux for us.

Manager Steve Cotterill said after the game, “We looked what we are, tired and leg weary and we looked as though we couldn’t get about the park.”
The teams were,

Wolves: Michael Oakes, Rob Edwards, Joleon Lescott, Jody Craddock, Lee Naylor, Ki-Hyeon Seol, Paul Ince, Seyi George Olofinjana, Mark Kennedy, Kenny Miller (Rohan Ricketts 79), Carl Cort. Subs not used: Paul Jones, Kevin Cooper, Keith Andrews, Leon Clarke.

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Frank Sinclair, Gary Cahill, John McGreal, Mo Camara, John Oster, Micah Hyde, Tony Grant, Pete Whittingham (Graham Branch 71), Dean Bowditch (Michael Duff 85), Jean-Louis Valois (Ian Moore 64). Subs not used: Danny Coyne, Lee Roche.

Previous 20 Seasons

Season

Div

Ven

Result

Att

Scorers

1986/87

4

a

1-0

5,786

Grewcock

..

h

2-5

2,947

Grewcock James

1987/88

4

a

0-3

10,002

.

..

h

0-3

10,386

.

.

SV

W

0-2

80,841

.

1994/95

1

h

0-1

17,766

.

.

.

a

0-2

25,703

.

2000/01

1

a

0-1

20,156

.

..

h

1-2

15,483

Branch

2001/02

1

a

0-3

24,893

.

..

h

2-3

21,823

I Moore Johnson

2002/03

1

a

0-3

25,031

.

.

.

h

2-1

18,641

Taylor West

2003/04

LC

a

0-2

18,548

.

2004/05

C

h

1-1

13,869

Blake

.

LC

h

1-1

5,013

Blake - won 4-2 on penalties

.

C

a

0-2

24,336

.

Click HERE to see more results against Wolves since our first meeting in the inaugral league season of 1888/89.