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Our last league visit there (to the old ground at Belle View) was 'on a sunny afternoon in Donny' back in 1991 when we won 4-1 on our way to the fourth division title. Andy Marriott an Mark Yates made their Burnley debuts and Yates (who two years later was sold to Doncaster) scored as did Mike Conroy (2) and Steve Harper.
Since then it has been a long climb back for Rovers. Their first move was down and into the Conference in 1998 and they had five years out of the league before a play off win saw them return in 2003. They won League Two a year later and have now, after four years, reached the Championship and will play at this level for the first time since the 1957/58 season.
It is just three years since we last played Forest. As they were heading down they beat us 1-0 at the City Ground courtesy of a Kris Commons goal. At a ground where we find winning difficult this was a game from which we really should have returned with all three points.
As is the case with Doncaster it will be a new ground for Burnley when we visit Swansea. The last time we were there was in December 1995 and the game provided Jimmy Mullen with his last ever away points as Burnley manager.
David Eyres and Kurt Nogan gave us a 2-0 lead but just past the hour the Swans scored twice in two minutes through Glynn Hurst and Steve Torpey. Andy Cooke proved to be the match winner though, netting twice to give us a 4-2 win.
The fixtures are published three weeks today and at some stage in the season we'll travel to play all of Swansea, Forest and Doncaster. Just as long as we don't have to go in August as we did with Scunthorpe a year ago.
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