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Thankfully I made kick off after horrendous hold ups on the M25, but in truth had I not got there until half time I'd have missed precious little from either side. It really was desperate stuff in the first 45 minutes with neither goalkeeper being asked to do much, and what they were asked to do they did comfortably.
We opted for hitting long balls up the pitch far too often for Martin Paterson and in all fairness he's never going to be at his best playing like that. Defensively, we certainly had a problem down our left hand side where John Oster in particular was given so much space to play in. Thankfully Palace were never able to capitalise from it.
The only really notable incident before half time was a yellow card for James Scowcroft, but in truth that hardly registered and when referee Iain Williamson brought proceedings to an end it was a thankful respite from the tedium.
They'd been the better side though to be fair without creating much and had totally dominated possession throughout that first period.
Half time was enjoyable. I'd spent the first half with one of our Belfast based friends and during the break got the opportunity to meet two regular visitors to Clarets Mad who are over from Australia. They'd flown into Heathrow and thankfully got to Selhurst Park just as the game was kicking off.
There was also the sight of our very own Captain Bertorelli (otherwise known as former media manager Edoardo Abis) who was taking in the game from the away seats.
Socialising over, it was time for the second half and that hardly registered incident soon became very important. In the very first minute of the second half Scowcroft went up to challenge with Clarke Carlisle and both fell to the ground requiring treatment.
Both got up but Williamson gave Scowcroft the pleasure of a second viewing of his yellow card, and despite dropping it the referee then waved the red. What a surprise given how experienced this referee is at card use.
We were stunned, but here was an opportunity against a ten man side who like us were desperately out of sorts. Things can only get better I thought, and they did. Seven minutes later that red card was waving again, this time at Shaun Derry who left the field with the Burnley fans giving a loud rendition of 'Time to Go'.
Between the two sendings off Warnock had made a change, and he quickly made another as he had to make further adjustments. As for us, surely it was time for Robbie Blake to add some genuine quality and I was bemoaning the fact that Alan Mahon wasn't on the bench.
It took over twelve minutes but finally Robbie came on and at last we started to take the game to them. But too often we were just hitting shots from long range, not often enough did we stretch them and as such we just continued to make it far too easy for them.
And things could have been worse. The Palace fans had by now turned on the referee, and I was wondering what on earth Warnock might have to say about him, and when he turned down a penalty the frustration grew from the home stands. There's no doubt for me that had he penalised Duff we could have had no complaints.
There was always that worry that things could get worse but most of the play was by now up the far end with Burnley on the attack, and finally we did get the ball in the net. From a left wing corner taken by Blake the keeper was blocked and Chris McCann turned the ball in.
From our vantage point it was difficult to see but TV shows he was blocked by his own defender although there looks to be a clear case of a push from Steven Caldwell. Maybe that decision was the right one.
As the clock ticked down we wasted set pieces, we put in poor shots from over twenty yards and the frustration was now growing in our section of the ground. We went into stoppage time and the announcer then revealed goalkeeper Speroni was man of the match. I wasn't sure what he'd done to receive that accolade but maybe the announcer knew that a minute later he was going to make a stunning point saving stop from Alexander.
It was as close as we got but in all fairness a win would hardly have been deserved. This side is a million miles away from being good enough just now, it is unsettled with too many changes and sometime soon we are going to have to turn this round. It's not often a Burnley side gets booed off away from home no matter what, and certainly a very rare event when it follows anything other than a defeat. I would think the last time was at Bradford in 2002 when again we failed to beat a team with nine men.
There weren't any good performances yesterday but Clarke Carlisle turned in a far better performance than he did last time round at Selhurst Park, whilst Alexander proved yet again he can be a real asset in that holding midfield role.
We did stop the rot at one end but we've also forgotten how to score goals, we need to get it right up there with some urgency.
The teams were;
Crystal Palace: Julian Speroni, Danny Butterfield, Patrick McCarthy, Matt Lawrence, Clint Hill, John Oster (Calvin Andrew 51), Tom Soares, Shaun Derry, Nick Carle (Kieran Djilali 80), Leandre Griffit (Jose Fonte 53), James Scowcroft. Subs not used: Victor Moses, Ben Watson.
Yellow Cards: James Scowcroft, Shaun Derry, Patrick McCarthy, Clint Hill, Jose Fonte.
Red Cards: James Scowcroft, Shaun Derry.
Burnley: Brian Jensen, Michael Duff (Robbie Blake 64), Clarke Carlisle, Steven Caldwell, Christian Kalvenes, Graham Alexander, Wade Elliott, Kevin McDonald (Joey Gudjonsson 74), Chris McCann, Chris Eagles, Martin Paterson (Ade Akinbiyi 82). Subs not used: Diego Penny, Stephen Jordan.
Yellow Cards:Martin Paterson, Kevin McDonald, Clarke Carlisle.
Referee: Iain Williamson (Berkshire).
Attendance: 14,071 (including 616 Clarets).