Lacklustre Clarets suffer home defeat

Last updated : 01 August 2009 By Tony Scholes
David Edgar
David Edgar - scored our consolation goal
Everything was in place for a great day back at the Turf, a first look at some of the new players for many Burnley fans and that first home game since Wembley.

Prior to kick off a minute's silence was observed for Tommy Cummings and Ray Griffiths, who have both passed recently, and Sir Bobby Robson who lost his battle against cancer yesterday. The mere mention of Robson's name brought spontaneous applause from all four sides of Turf Moor and the following silence was observed impeccably.

And so to the game. Owen Coyle had named Brian Jensen in goal with a back four in front of him of Tyrone Mears, Clarke Carlisle, Steven Caldwell and Christian Kalvenes. We started with Graham Alexander in the holding role, a four in front of that of Chris Eagles, Wade Elliott, Chris McCann and Robbie Blake with new signing Steven Fletcher up front.

However, that was quickly changed to a 4-4-2 system with Elliott on the right, Eagles on the left and Blake partnering Fletcher.

The performance throughout the game though just wasn't good enough. I won't call it worrying or concerning because after all it was nothing more than a pre-season game, but there would be some real concerns in the league if we were to offer a team anything like as many chances as we did League One Leeds this afternoon.

It was a performance that lacked just about any positive ingredient. There was precious little movement, it looked laboured and the passing was just about as poor as it could possibly have been.

In the first half in particular we were very poor defensively and how on earth we didn't concede at least three or four goals is anyone's guess. Maybe because the opposition had League One standard strikers in their line up who contrived to miss some of the easiest chances possible.

We were very shaky in both full back positions whilst the two central defenders were far from inspiring. After a succession of misses they did finally take the lead when Steven Caldwell slipped to let in Mike Grella who this time made no mistake.

Enoch Showunmi (or whatever our PA man called him) had already missed two incredibly easy chances whilst they'd hit the post from a free kick. At the other end of the pitch we hadn't troubled them at all until the last minute of the half when Eagles should have equalised.

There was one change at half time with Richard Eckersley coming on at right back and he had a decent second half. But there was still precious little from the Clarets although we weren't allowing them quite so much in the way of opportunities in our box.

League One Leeds did get a second when Robert Snodgrass crossed from the left. Andy Robinson got on the end of it beyond the first post and hit his shot back across Jensen and into the far corner.

That prompted another rush of substitutes and one of them, David Edgar, pulled a goal back when he got onto a Wade Elliott cross following a corner. It prompted little enthusiasm to be honest, made worse by having to endure the goal music. 

Unfortunately it didn't prompt a revival and when Graham Laws (and I couldn't even find any reason to blame him this time) blew the final whistle we could have no complaints whatsoever about the result.

There's no doubt that the performance was simply not good enough, not by some distance, but it also has to be put into context. Losing has not cost us any points, it hasn't seen us go out of a cup competition, and we are still two weeks away from playing our first competitive match of the season.

That's the time to start judging us, not now, and I don't expect us to turn in this sort of lacklustre performance when we turn up at the Windy City in two weeks time.

The teams were;

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Tyrone Mears (Richard Eckersley 45), Clarke Carlisle (David Edgar 69), Steven Caldwell, Christian Kalvenes (Stephen Jordan 55), Graham Alexander (Kevin McDonald 69), Chris Eagles, Wade Elliott, Chris McCann (Joey Gudjonsson 69), Robbie Blake (Steven Thompson 55), Steven Fletcher (Jay Rodriguez 69). Subs not used: Diego Penny, Brian Easton.

League One Leeds: Casper Ankergren, Jason Crowe (Robert Snodgrass 62), Ben Parker (Aidan White 72), Jonathan Howson, Rui Marques (Lubomir Michalik 45), Patrick Kisnorbo (Paul Huntington 62), Andy Hughes, David Prutton, Enoch Showunmi (Alan Sheehan 78), Mike Grella, Bradley Johnson (Andy Robinson 62). Sub not used: Shane Higgs.

Referee: Graham Laws (Whitley Bay).

Attendance: 7,899.