Clarke and Ty take the honours at Stoke

Clarke Carlisle - early leader with Tyrone Mears

However, it was Wade Elliott, scorer of that glorious goal at Wembley that won us our place in the Premier League, who won the man of the match vote. He polled no less than 28.5% of the vote and that gave him the edge over Carlisle, the Wembley man of the match, who was just behind with 24.3%.

Tyrone Mears, one of two debutants in the starting line up, came third with 16.7% of the vote. But there was even better news for Mears who won the player ratings thread on the message board.

He had a rating of 7.00 out of 10 and that was just ahead of Carlisle whose rating was 6.97 whilst stand in captain Graham Alexander was third with a rating of 6.89 out of 10.

As has been the case over the previous two seasons we'll be using both the man of the match vote and the player ratings to award points towards the Clarets Mad Player of the Year, won last season by Robbie Blake.

Again points will be awarded to the top three players in each with three to the winner, two to second and one for third place and that gives us the following after the first game:

4: Clarke Carlisle & Tyrone Mears
3: Wade Elliott
1: Graham Alexander