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Of course the PC brigade some years ago tried to maintain it was a derogatory racial slur to do with the slave trade of which Bristol was part. Good try lads but no cigar (whoops persons).
Discussions before the Coventry game centred on Eagles and his elusive form; everyone wanted to see the return of his earlier rampant impact on games. In the old days a winger was given some latitude by an understanding crowd. Way back then in the 50s and 60s when tricky wing play was standard stuff until Sir Alf put the brakes on it; it was accepted by a crowd that no winger could beat his man every time. If there was a 50% success rate this was fine. We were patient and understanding. When the winger failed to get by his full-back we just sighed, shrugged it off, and waited for the next attempt. Today, football is less forgiving and the likes of poor old Chris Eagles and Wade Elliott get short shrift when they lose the ball.
The old guy sat next to us groaned when Elliot came on against Millwall. "Errrgh what's ee cumin on for?" he griped. Mrs T took umbrage. "Because he's the best crosser of a ball we've got," she humphed. The old guy was suitably chastened and shrunk back into his seat. I knew how he felt. At his age he should have known better anyway and remembered that John Connelly, Brian Pilkington, Willie Morgan, Ralphie Coates et al, didn't always beat their man. It just seemed like it.
Coventry arrived without a manager. Boothroyd had been sacked a couple of days before meaning Coventry had had something like 99 managers in the last 10 years. They're an unforgiving lot down there. Their chairman made a reference to the style of Boothroyd football. "It might be alright when you're winning," he said. And he'd had a few letters, he added. Alas they weren't winning. Of course Burnley had to be one of the few teams Coventry had beaten within living memory and that was the game when the depth of feeling against Brian Laws really emerged in the open. I know two people at Coventry who rue the day they moved the stadium and saddled themselves with a place they can't pay for. It's a complicated financial set-up down there and they lose money hand over fist, their poverty now based on earlier grandiose ideas. That stadium is a financial disaster.
Anyway: Burnley were just about shipshape and Bristol fashion in the first half against Coventry and went a goal up. They were neat and tidy (but toothless) for much of the Millwall game of course until they too lay over on their sides and Millwall engulfed them in the second half. It was the same against Coventry. In the second half Burnley vanished. It was as if there were two Burnley teams, one for each half. This was the third consecutive home game where the away team took complete control in the second half. Coventry must have wondered how they went away with just the one point. Again supporters came away puzzled this time wondering if the manager would make changes for the next game away at Bristol City.
Only Marney until injured, Grant and Rodriguez distinguished themselves in the Coventry game; Grant with some fine saves and Rodders with two goals the second when a Coventry win looked on the cards.
And so the chance to really close the gap was lost and on this showing people were becoming resigned to a tame end to the season. In the second half this was a display that for long spells was heartless as Coventry took complete control and yet again a visiting team looked fitter, sharper and more incisive than a slow moving, and thinking, Burnley side that never controlled midfield. Yet again passes went astray, movement up front and running into space at pace was minimal. Play was pedantic, laboured and ineffective. And after a good first half with Burnley the dominant side it was all the more frustrating and downright puzzling.
By the end Coventry possession was 57% to Burnley's 43%. You'd have thought it was a home game for them. In truth 2-2 was flattering to a poor second half Burnley side. Frankly it was worrying. Just two games after the stirring win at Hull, you could not imagine this side getting the 6th play-off place. There was a spell when fans loudly chanted for Bikey. They had a point. Rumours circulated that his non selection was due to attitude problems. If that was the case then why even put him on the bench? Eddie Howe after the game hinted at changes.
Mrs T and I loaded our gear onto the 1 o clock supporters coach on Friday afternoon for the trip to Bristol and two nights in the city centre Marriott Hotel. We used to visit Bristol regularly when she still had family down there many years ago. Been a while since we last did a coach trip but there were all the usual faces that turn up for a weekend trip. Fewer than usual twas true for reasons to do with the economics of the thing. What's clear is just how little spare cash people have got these days. The coach was only half full. Our last trip to see a Burnley game there was way back in '72/73 the promotion season - a good omen maybe we wondered before the game (not afterwards that's for sure).
Apart from the depressing result it was a delightful weekend, the weather glorious, the hotel splendidly placed in the city centre, the river and harboursides within an easy walk, the old castle park just across the road. For Mrs T a chance to wallow in nostalgia, lots of her family from Bristol, her great grandfather was a shipping broker; her grandmother born in a house in Queens Square where we walked and found the site, her father went to school there. She's into this family tree stuff and her grandfather was a ship's captain and sailed from Bristol to New York many times. Sunday was spent wandering round Clifton and the Downs (her uncle had a grocery shop there), with a walk across the Suspension Bridge. There's a sign at each end that suggests you contact the Samaritans if you have problems. It's a pity there wasn't one outside Ashton Gate, half the team could have given them a call after the game.
There was a telling statistic in the programme under the heading Team Leaders. Burnley topped the list of clubs with the most shots off target. No wonder we're labouring and struggling in games, I thought. And another half dozen were added during the first half. It really was abysmal. "What the bloody hell do they do all week," was the question on peoples' lips at halftime where we sat. The tame, powder-puff inaccuracy was embarrassing. It was a bit better in the second half but I can't really recall any on-target shot that really tested James when he had saves to make. He could have sat in a deckchair all afternoon was one comment.
Burnley fashioned little of note. A Bikey header from a good position that went straight to James; Rodriguez clean through but failed to take the ball in his stride, and that was about it other than gentle, optimistic shots from distance. Iwelumo came on; nobody was sure why. The Fonz came on and showed a bit of dash. Iwelumo in a brief moment of activity was clearly held down in the box and the referee predictably waved play on.
This was a side lacking in form, incisiveness, penetration, forward movement and defensive reliablity. We wanted Bikey back and we got him. But the old problem remained. Whenever he had possession your heart was in your mouth and your hand over your eyes; or was it the other way round. On top of that the word portly springs to mind. But he's like Mike Tyson. I wouldn't actually say it to him if I was standing within reach.
The first goal was the result of one player being skinned out wide and the scorer being left unmarked with the time to control, turn and slam it home. The second goal was the result of a long punt catching Carlisle on the hop. It was a horrible goal to give away and sapped the life out of Burnley. From that point on the result was a foregone conclusion; there was the suspicion the players thought so too, and it was more fun counting the seagulls which made a welcome change from counting pigeons at Turf Moor. There was plenty of possession, plenty of passing moves, but none of them troubled Bristol one jot.
Bristol had two players on the day who were excellent; Campbell-Ryce on one wing, and Albert Adomah (love the name) on the other. The latter was outstanding and whizzed past Fox at will. We hazarded a guess that they were on half the wages of players like Eagles and Delfouneso, or even less than half, but they gave Burnley a lesson. The lack of tempo in this Burnley side, the lack of sharpness and swiftness of thought is worrying. Everything was laboured, the build-ups predictably plodding. It was difficult to discern any real plan or intention. The lack of a damned good centre-forward was glaring.
Coming out of the ground afterwards a couple of Bristol supporters were saying this was the best they'd seen them play all season. In three games then Burnley had made Millwall look good, Coventry look good and Bristol look good.
The coach returned to the hotel. The grumbles and gripes were loud, clear and understandable; suicidal defending, nay inept defending, individual errors, lack of real leadership, lack of moves at pace and for sure these overpaid players were being given lessons by guys on far less. 1,172 away fans deserved a greater will to win. Sorry lads but I felt short-changed. Some of you get in a week what my OAPension brings in a year. The injured players were sadly missed. Back in the hotel £9.30 for a gin and tonic was by the way outrageous I thought and I was in a mood to be truculent.
"That surely can't be £9.30," I said grumpily and that was nowt to do with being a tight-fisted Yorkshire pensioner.
"It's a double," he said haughtily. I bridled a bit more. A bit of the old headteacher in me surfaced.
"I didn't ask for a double," I said in the same tone that I used to speak to any snotty-nosed parent.
"Alright then," he said and snatched it away. He poured another, a single I presumed, and charged me £6.
"My God," said Mrs T when I got back to the table. "This is strong, is it a double?"
Through dinner we carried on moaning and humphing. This was not a game where you don't mind a 200 mile journey home because there has been a close-fought game, chances to score, near misses, great shots, great saves by the opposition goalie, or a game when you can blame the referee. There was none of that. Not for a minute did Burnley ever look like scoring, toothless probably the best word and second to every ball in the final third. We could have done with an Adomah.
Sunday morning in Bristol was pleasant enough. There was of course no rush to buy the Sunday papers to read the reports while we munched through a Full English. Eventually though we looked at the results page to see the other scores and the Championship table. Yet again results had been kind and even though three games had yielded just one point there was still no need to leap off Brunel's bridge into the river below, in despair. Astonishingly Burnley still had a more than decent chance to make the play-offs if they could sort themselves out, come up with a plan, players like Eagles and Cork rediscover their earlier form and ALL OF THEM COULD GET MORE SHOTS ON TARGET.
Thus far, before Bristol, there were 247 shots off target; just think if only 10 of them had been better how many more points that might have been.