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It broke the deadlock early in the second half and from the minute it left his boot it was clear from the other end exactly where it was going. It screamed into the net to Steve Bank’s left and the goalkeeper never had a hope.
I always find the Britannia Stadium a strange sort of place, it doesn’t look anything like a new ground, the stands are all different in style and don't look as thought they were all built at the same time for a new stadium. It is one of the less impressive of the new stadia and certainly less intimidating than the old Victoria Ground.
Today there was no atmosphere whatsoever with the home fans subdued and I have to report that even Delilah missed the game. But these are desperate times in the Potteries and on today’s showing the Football League’s only Icelandic club are heading back down to Division Two.
As for the Clarets we struggled to get into the game as we had done on Wednesday and after a brief and bright opening from us the game deteriorated with neither side able to make too much progress.
Stoke had more of the possession but this didn’t seem to bother the Clarets too much and apart from one effort from their only impressive player, James O’Connor, and a disallowed goal for offside they hardly bothered us.
"This game has 0-0 written all over it," I was told not too long after kick off and it was not difficult to agree as passes went astray time after time. That bite and the up and at ‘em approach that so upset Toothpick had all but disappeared as players seemed to have great difficulty in getting to grips with the game in the windy conditions.
That said apart from one short spell we weren’t in much danger at the back but it is probably fair to say that we didn’t cause Steve Banks too much trouble in the Stoke goal.
Half time came, not surprisingly at 0-0, and the opinion seemed to be that the game was there for the taking against a Stoke side that were as bad as anything we have played. As you would expect for a side managed by Tony Pulis they are less than tactically astute.
There style of play is something of an insult to some of the names found outside the ground, recollections of past days, with names such as George Eastham, Tony Waddington and Dennis Violet alongside Sir Stanley Matthews.
Vince Overson was their half time guest to make the draw but the big news for Clarets’ fans was the announcement over the public address system that all tickets for our cup tie at Watford had been sold.
It looked as though we were going to take the game to Stoke in the second half and for the first ten minutes the ball never saw the Burnley penalty box. This was our best spell so far and Stan decided to introduce Glen Little at this point.
However before Glen could get on Fred scored the screamer, at the Boothen End in front of the Stoke fans just like Ally had done four seasons ago. Glen took his seat again and you sensed that the game might be won, there seemed little hope of this Stoke side conjuring anything resembling an equaliser.
And so it was as Burnley defended with some ease with the home side completely lacking in any ideas. It is fair to say that our defenders did have some work to do but it was all pretty routine stuff.
Stoke changed their strikers and that saw a first appearance of 2003 for former Claret Andy Cooke alongside Chris Iwelumo but if anything it went worse. Cookey put one effort over the bar but Coxy and Driss had them in their pockets.
We just run the clock down as Stoke just about gave up and collected the three points. That is 47 and only 3 short of Stan’s initial target of 50. But even if we were to lose our remaining games (all 14 of them) then there is little hope of us going down with 47 points. Stoke for one will be nowhere near that total come the end of the season and Grimsby, Brighton and Sheffield Wednesday will also be well short.
So I think it is time to crack on now, we are safe, so we can see where it takes us. I’m not so sure as to whether we can make the play offs or not, our ability to be inconsistent will probably take care of that.
It wasn’t a great afternoon entertainment wise but the best teams win when they don’t play well. Safe from relegation with fourteen games to play, in with a chance of the play offs and in the last eight of the FA Cup. With that in mind I think I can excuse them an off day that still brings us another three points.
Once again the Man of the Match must come from the two central defenders who never allowed Stoke any opportunities and it is Driss Diallo for me again. What a find he has been.
Referee Phil Joslin for the second time this season kept his cards in his pocket at a Burnley game. He made some mistakes for sure this afternoon but allowed the game to flow and did a good job for me. He was almost unnoticeable at times and that is just how it should be.
So it’s bags packed again and we head south for our next two games at Millwall and Watford looking for more points and some more FA Cup glory. Who knows just where cracking on will have taken us by the time we eventually get back to Turf Moor for the Leicester game in over two weeks time.
The teams today were,
Stoke: Steve Banks, Marcus Hall, Sergei Shtaniuk, Peter Handyside, Wayne Thomas, Bjarni Gudjonsson, James O’Connor, Brynjar Gunnarsson, Peter Hoekstra, Lee Mills (Chris Iwelumo 69), Chris Greenacre (Andy Cooke 70). Subs not used: Jani Viander, Frazer Richardson, Lewis Neal.
Burnley: Marlon Beresford, Dean West, Ian Cox, Driss Diallo, Graham Branch, Paul Cook (Mark McGregor 82), Ian Moore, Tony Grant, Lee Briscoe, Alan Moore (Paul Weller 71), Gareth Taylor. Subs not used: Nik Michopoulos, Glen Little, Robbie Blake.
Referee: Phil Joslin (Newark).