It was another valuable afternoon of game time for many of the Burnley squad with only central defender Kevin Long getting the full ninety minutes, and despite there being no points at stake it is still good to get a win, more so having lost the game at Preston last Monday.
I suppose I wondered what we were going to get from this afternoon as I prepared to leave home, particularly given Blackpool's farcical pre-season. What I didn't expect was coming up against traffic problems every bit as bad as those we faced on Good Friday the last time we made the journey to the town supposedly noted for fresh air and fun.
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| Marvin Sordell scored Burnley's winner |
Once again we took the Preston dock route, and from speaking to Burnley fans who made alternative detours, it proved to be the best option. Even so, it delayed our arrival and therefore the traditional lunch was cut short meaning no pudding.
We had a quick drive down the prom, prom, prom, reminiscing about our Easter visit, the day I'm sure just about every Burnley fan realised how the 2013/14 season was finally going to unfold.
And, just as a reminder, we won the game again 1-0 this afternoon but worryingly there remained no sign of the goalscorer from that afternoon Michael Kightly.
We missed the pre-match Oyston demo; it might have been fun, but I'm out of practice with these things, so long is it since Frank Teasdale was Burnley chairman. I have to say though that at least Frank cared, and still does, about the fortunes of our club.
The Clarets were black today and our goalkeeper was white. I don't like this away kit at all and I'm not sure whether I'll ever get used to it, but black it was and with some of our goalkeeping pool reluctant to wear green, and the orange out of the question in the land of tangerines and tennis balls, it meant Alex Cisak and Matt Gilks both wore white.
It was clear from the team news that Sean Dyche was going to give everyone a run out. Players such as Kieran Trippier, Michael Duff, Scott Arfield and Danny Ings were all on the bench. It was the strong pair of Dean Marney and David Jones in the midfield and there was a Burnley debut finally for Steven Reid after recovering from injury.
Most of the Blackpool trialists were on the bench, but two started, one in goal, who we believe to be Elliott Parrish, and the other at left back.
This was nothing like the Preston game. At Deepdale the home side were very much up for it and played it as if there were points in the offing. Blackpool were playing a sort of getting to know you and, frankly, were second best from the kick off until the final whistle.
It was not the easiest of pitches to play on either. Blackpool might have problems with players but it looks very likely that they are going to have some serious problems with the Bloomfield Road pitch giving the poor state it was in today, making it difficult at times to play any good football.
But we did play some good stuff on another warm afternoon and might well have had more goals than the one we got.
Last week at Accrington, Marney missed the goals by some distance when put through, but today he was a lot closer. Sordell played the ball to him on the edge of the box and his left foot shot hit the bar before bouncing to safety.
Sordell was also close, seeing a shot hit the stanchion, as we looked to get the breakthrough.
One real positive in the first half was the performance of Ashley Barnes. He's been out injured for the last two games but I thought he gave the Blackpool defenders a difficult first half and linked up well with his strike partner.
It wasn't all one way in that first half, but Blackpool never gave the impression that they were going to create much and the most Cisak was required to do was deal with a couple of through balls.
We made three changes at the start of the second half and there were more to come during the next 45 minutes as ten of the starters eventually gave way, but we just got more on top than we'd done in the first half as Blackpool introduced a few players all with the name Trialist.
Trippier, one of our subs, was instrumental in the goal. His cross was met beyond the far post by the very impressive Danny Lafferty who had moved into the midfield following the introduction of Ben Mee.
Lafferty's header back across goal was completely missed by Marney but Sordell was on it quickly to finish well.
We could have had more goals too as we took total control, but it was 1-0 at the final whistle as our tour of Lancashire ended, with two very different friendlies to come now against Celta Vigo and Hellas Verona to bring the pre-season to an end.
I'm looking forward to them and then we'll be ready for Chelsea in 16 days time.
I'm not going to do a Hyde and give all the trialists well known names, so the teams were;
Blackpool: Trialist 1 (believed to be Elliott Parrish), Tony McMahon, Trialist 2, David Perkins, Peter Clarke, Donervon Daniels, Sergei Zenjov, Jacob Mellis, Nathan Delfouneso, Andreas Orlandi, Tomasz Cywka. Subs: Charles Dunne, Mark Waddington, Dom Telford, Trialist 3, Trialist 4, Trialist 5, Trialist 6, Trialist 7, Trialist 8, Trialist 9.
Burnley: Alex Cisak (Matt Gilks ht), Steven Reid (Kieran Trippier 65), Kevin Long, Jason Shackell (Michael Duff ht), Danny Lafferty (Luke O'Neill 73), Ross Wallace (Jason Gilchrist 82), Dean Marney (Steven Hewitt 73), David Jones (Ben Mee 62), Matt Taylor (Scott Arfield ht), Marvin Sordell (Lukas Jutkiewicz 68), Ashley Barnes (Danny Ings 65). Sub not used: Tom Anderson.
Referee: Graham Salisbury (Lancashire).
Attendance: 2,389 (including 962 Clarets).