New players, but no change

News broke at around 11:00 a.m. that neither Frank Sinclair nor John McGreal would be playing and that made it easier for Steve Cotterill to name his side with Wayne Thomas and Michael Duff in the central defensive positions and loanee debutant Phil Bardsley playing at right back.

In the absence of Micah Hyde and Frank, Thomas was captain for the day against his former club but there was not even a starting place for former ex-Stokie Gifton Noel-Williams who had to settle for a place on the bench with second debutant Andy Gray lining up alongside Michael Ricketts.

Steve Cotterill was expected to get some abuse as he came out just before kick off but in fact he made his way to the bench a good ten minutes before the scheduled start and just sat there awaiting the teams. There was something of an angry reaction to his arrival but the home fans have more on their plates right now with the manager still at war with his staff that saw Rudge and De Koning told to stay away.

Hopes were higher amongst the fans before kick off, perhaps due to the two signings and perhaps due to the fact that results have favoured at this particular venue, those hopes were fading fast I'm afraid long before the final whistle.

We probably started the brighter of the two but that's saying little against a Stoke side that at times looked frightened to go anywhere near the ball. They started by trying to knock us out of our stride with an over physical approach that referee Fletcher hardly noticed despite giving free kick after free kick.

We were hardly troubled by them and even when they did get forward everything was soundly dealt with by our defence where the new look central partnership were doing well. At the other end there wasn't anything quite so good to report with just one run from Graham Branch to excite us. Even then he spoiled it with an awful ball played out to Garreth O'Connor after he had turned the nasty Carl Hoefkens inside out.

It looked all set to end goalless at half time but then, out of the blue, both sides had chances had half time approached. Firstly Chris McCann got to a cross from Branch but headed over the bar and then Stoke's Paul Gallagher looked a certain scorer before his shot was blocked by Thomas.

No goals at half time was about right, it had been dire stuff but at least we weren't behind. Unfortunately that was all set to change early in the second half when Gallagher gave the home side the lead.

It's not often I write about a game after having seen the goal action again on television and it does certainly change your mind. My first thoughts were that Bardsley had left Gallagher unmarked but that was not the case at all, he'd come into the centre to join Thomas as Duff went out to the left to support Harley. So no criticism on any of the defenders, but where was the backtracking midfield player, why was their no support?

Gallagher got his own back on the Burnley crowd by celebrating in front of them and the crowd responded by demanding a yellow card for the player on loan from Blackburn. Referee Fletcher just laughed but rules are rules and he had no option but to yellow card the scorer.

I think it is ridiculous, it was ridiculous when Michael Ricketts was booked at Ipswich but rules are rules. That booking at Ipswich, added to other yellow cards, means Ricketts will now miss the games against Southampton and Sheffield Wednesday whilst in an almost identical situation this time there was no action.

Not long after he was yellow carded, that should have seen him leave the field. It is inconsistent refereeing time and time again – Ricketts at Ipswich and Cisse at Newcastle yesterday but nothing here, it needs sorting.

That shouldn't be allowed to hide just how poor we were though and the prediction in the away end that we were beaten once the goal went in proved to be a correct one. We don't look like a side capable of fighting our way back into a game, and it is a long, long time since we last saw that goal against Plymouth.

We did get the ball into the net, and Ricketts finished well, but the flag was already up after the assistant saw the handball from Gray. We weren't to come close again and fell to yet another defeat.

It's a miserable time to be a Claret, we'd been lifted by events during the week but come match day it was another desperate ninety minutes with precious little to enthuse about. We did though have some good performers and it isn't difficult to pick out Bardsley, Thomas and Duff. It's not a difficult choice for man of the match for me, that's Michael Duff by some distance.

Elsewhere on the pitch the main problem was the midfield which never stamped any authority on the game. Both James and Garreth O'Connor had stinkers and apart from a couple of runs we didn't get anything like enough from Graham Branch. Poor Chris McCann must have wondered at times what he was in the middle of. It's a major problem area made worse by the absence of Micah Hyde.

Well done and thanks to Hull, QPR and Leicester who took points from the bottom three. I know these results dropped us further down the league but they did prevent the bottom three getting any closer.

It's the worst run of defeats since the 1994/95 season at this level under Jimmy Mullen and the longest run without a goal since Chris Waddle tried his hand at management. We are desperate for a win and we need it before we get to Hillsborough for our next away game.

The teams were,

Stoke: Steve Simonsen, Carl Hoefkens, Michael Duberry, Clint Hill, Marlon Broomes (Lewis Buxton 45), Darel Russell (Luke Chadwick 62), Josip Skoko, Dave Brammer, Paul Gallagher, Mamady Sidibe, Sammy Bangoura (Hans Sigurdsson 80). Subs not used: Ed de Goey, Junior.

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Phil Bardsley, Wayne Thomas, Michael Duff, Jon Harley, Garreth O'Connor (Wade Elliott 64), James O'Connor, Chris McCann (Gifton Noel-Williams 79), Graham Branch (John Spicer 85), Michael Ricketts, Andy Gray. Subs not used: Danny Karbassiyoon, Kyle Lafferty.

Referee: Mick Fletcher (Warley).

Attendance: 12,082.