Back to winning ways on Grezza's day

Last updated : 17 April 2011 By Tony Scholes
Chris Eagles
With the Clarets leading 2-1, and hardly looking in any danger of losing it, the moment came with 87 minutes on the clock with Chris Eagles the privileged on going off and getting the first opportunity to pass their congratulations on to the Burnley skipper.

We'll look more closely at that achievement during early next week but for now it is good to report a win, our first since a Nathan Delfouneso goal gave us a 1-0 victory at Hull some five and a half weeks ago.

Ahead of this game with the current Clarets I spoke to former Burnley winger Leighton James who promised a difficult afternoon for his first club against the team, he believes, are the best footballing side in the division.

For this difficult game, Eddie Howe made just the one change and one that was forced on him with Marvin Bartley beginning a suspension. Jay Rodriguez returned after missing the Forest game with an injury.

It was an open affair but Swansea, right in the promotion mix, had the better of it. There were half chances at either end but the visitors were beginning to cause us some problems. Those problems could, and probably should, have been magnified as the Swans managed to hit the woodwork twice in a five minute spell.

Former Burnley loan player Nathan Dyer used his pace to get in on the right hand side before crossing for Darren Pratley. Thankfully the midfielder didn't make the most of his opportunity and saw his shot come back off the post.

That post, to Brian Jensen's left, was soon to be our best defender as it kept another one out five minutes later. This time Pratley was the supplier with Scott Sinclair heading against the same post only to see it deflect straight into Jensen's hands.

Swansea were, as Leighton (I can't call him Taffy when we're playing a Welsh club) warned, passing the ball around at will and created two more opportunities for loan striker Fabio Borini but he missed the target twice.

It wasn't one way traffic by any means but the real goalscoring opportunities were going Swansea's way and by half time, on chances alone, it was fair to say we were somewhat fortunate to go in level.

The start of the second half started in a similar fashion. Borini hit a shot wide in the very first minute and then, as Burnley started to come into the game, he gave Swansea the lead. As hands went up for an offside flag that didn't come, Borini was able to go through and never looked as though he wouldn't score.

I'm not so sure it was offside, Eddie Howe himself said he believed it wasn't. The television pictures don't give any clue but in any case it's irrelevant, the goal was given.

Behind for the seventh successive game, another defeat looked on the cards, but four minutes later we got just the slice of luck we needed. Howe, almost immediately after the goal, replaced the disappointing Delfouneso with Chris Iwelumo but the substitute was not involved as we drew level.

It comes from Eagles, now moved onto the left. He moved inside the defender and then hit in a right footed cross. It was Swansea's Ashley Williams that got to it to head home past Dorus de Vries, the ball going right into the corner. It was the first own goal in our favour on the Turf since Chris Perry added to two from Joey Gudjonsson in a 3-2 win against Southampton in December 2008.

Swansea reacted as Jensen was forced into a good save but the goal had very much changed the game and Burnley were now the team in the ascendancy. Rodgers made changes with the likes of Luke Moore and Tamas Priskin coming on, but with just under a quarter of an hour left we got the chance to go in front.

Jay Rod was trying to get on the end of a fine cross from Wade Elliott but went down under a challenge from the wonderfully named Angel Rangel. Referee Webb unhesitatingly pointed to the spot despite Swansea protests.

It was our first league penalty since Watford in November. Alexander converted that after Eagles, in the game prior to that against Doncaster, had missed. Eagles had no worries on that score and hammered home to give us the lead.

Jack Cork might have doubled the lead soon after as the expected onslaught from Swansea failed to materialise. I can't recall Jensen being called upon to do too much once we were in front.

Then came the moment as Grezza reached 1,000. He almost scored too, and incredibly in the 9th minute of stoppage time. We won a free kick and it was curling into the top corner. Disappointingly de Vries hadn't read the script and tipped it onto the underside of the bar.

It didn't matter - we'd got our win and Grezza had got his 1,000th game.

I'm not getting too excited about the remainder of the season. In truth we'll probably have to win the last five to have any real chance of making the top six and I don't think we'll do this.

But I enjoyed this game. It's been torturous at times recently, never more so than at Leicester, and there almost seemed an end of season feel to it. Yesterday we got to grips with it, and against a good team. We didn't let going behind drop any heads; just the opposite and we reacted positively to it.

It was good to see some players coming back into some sort of form and hopefully we'll be able to carry that on and turn in another good performance, hopefully with another good result, against Middlesbrough on Tuesday.

Finally, and I won't tire of writing this. CONGRATULATIONS GREZZA.



The teams were;

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Tyrone Mears, Michael Duff, Andre Bikey, Danny Fox, Jack Cork, Dean Marney, Wade Elliott, Chris Eagles (Graham Alexander 87), Jay Rodriguez (Steven Thompson 90+5), Nathan Delfouneso (Chris Iwelumo 55). Subs not used: Lee Grant, Clarke Carlisle, Shane Duffy, Ross Wallace.
Yellow Cards: Michael Duff, Tyrone Mears, Danny Fox.

Swansea: Dorus de Vries, Angel Rangel, Neil Taylor, Ashley Williams, Garry Monk, Leon Britton, Mark Gower, Darren Pratley (Luke Moore 68), Scott Sinclair (Tamas Priskin 68), Nathan Dyer (Stephen Dobbie 82), Fabio Borini. Subs not used: Yves Ma-Kalambay, Alan Tate, Andrea Orlandi, Craig Beattie.
Yellow Cards: Mark Gower, Scott Sinclair, Fabio Borini.

Referee: David Webb (Sunderland).

Attendance: 13,675.