Burnley arrive for tribal tussle that holds genuine animosity

The nerves are starting to kick in. It’s derby time back home with our Claret chums from near the Yorkshire border dropping into Ewood for a Saturday dinner time date with Rovers (that’s lunchtime to the rest of the world outside northern England). Yes, I still call lunch dinner and confuse everybody but myself. And while the majority of people sit down for dinner, I still eat tea. It’s a 10pm kick-off Adelaide time live on the box so there will be plenty of time for both. I don’t even know if I’m looking forward to the game. For the first time in generations, Burnley will start favourites. They edged it last time, 2-1, on their way to an unlikely but probably deserved promotion to the Premier League. We hadn’t suffered that fate since 1979 as Rovers had mainly been able to lord it over ex-butcher Bob Lord’s club. It was a strange feeling and even from 12,000 miles away it’s not one that I want repeating. It is a derby that doesn’t hog the headlines but is a genuinely nasty confrontation both on and off the field. Visiting fans for both games have to be shipped in on coaches in specially policed convoys. The travel costs are incorporated into the price of the match ticket. It’s the only way to get into to the game. I did it myself for the Turf Moor FA Cup tie of 2005 and I found all the police cars at roundabouts and helicopters overhead like something out of an episode of DCI Banks. But the loathing among the fans is mutual. I just wonder what happens in any ‘neutral’ pub with supporters of both clubs watching the action live on telly in somewhere like Whalley. Maybe they need security there too. When Graeme Souness’s Rovers locked horns with Stan Ternent’s Burnley near Christmas 2000 in the first East Lancashire League derby for 17 years, both managers held a summit to tell the respective fans to behave themselves. The Sunday Times picked up on the fervour in the intro to its preview of hostilities. On the same day old foes Liverpool and Manchester United were going toe to toe and Arsenal were taking on Tottenham Hotspur. But The Sunday Times had a feel of what was brewing between the Clarets and Blue and Whites. The piece began: “Forget Liverpool v Manchester United or North London handbags, the real fierce derby action will be elsewhere today.” They had it right of course. As Rovers completed a 2-0 victory, incensed Burnley fans, unable to break the police cordon around the travelling Rovers’ revellers, decided to trash their own town. It is not the first time Burnley fans have shown their dim-witted attributes. And when I tell this tale to any outsiders, to this day they still look at me in disbelief. This weekend the Rovers v Burnley game will again be overshadowed by more high-profile local skirmishes with City visiting United in the Manchester conflagration while in the North-East Newcastle United nip down to Sunderland in the Tyne-Wear affair. I never sampled a North-East derby during my time working up there but I believe travel arrangements are pretty similar to East Lancashire. My Geordie mates Simon Malia, Ged Clarke, Mick Ramsay and Chris Baiyyyyynes assure me the atmosphere can be quite lively. Again, I wonder what it must be like in territory where loyalties are divided 50-50. Some of the pubs in South Shields would provide interesting viewing vicinities for that match on the box. So it should be a spicy weekend all round. Perhaps, the last word should go to Sir Alex Ferguson, who knows a thing or two about derby rivalries over the years in Scotland and Manchester. In one of his autobiographies he recounts how he used to receive regular abuse from other clubs’ fans when he went to see games to check out a player as a potential transfer target or sound out future opposition for his Manchester United side. This was in the early 90s when Rovers were tussling with United at the top of the Premier League. “I got stick from fans everywhere I went,” he recalled. “Except Burnley. There they would just say to me: ‘you can’t let them win the title, you just can’t’ ”. The ‘they’ referred to Rovers. Ferguson was amazed by the depth of feeling. “Jeez, I would love to see a derby between those two – there would probably be bodies lying around on the pitch.” Not quite, but you get the picture. Of course, Burnley were almost an irrelevance to us in those heady days which now seem so far away. Times change. So fasten your seat-belts for tomorrow’s encounter. It might be a bumpy ride.

Watford and Cherries move up in unlikely footballing scenario

The curtain comes down on another English football season for the lesser lights. That is for those of us who follow clubs outside the glory-glory land of the Premier League. Yet the Championship is so unpredictable that unfancied outfits such as Watford and AFC Bournemouth have already booked their places among the elite next season. When you consider how many so-called sleeping giants are engaged in the week to week conflicts, it is no mean feat. But what lies ahead for the lucky social climbers? Until a few weeks ago the bottom three places in the Premier League were occupied by the trio of promoted sides from last season. Namely that is Leicester City, QPR and our Claret cousins from near the Yorkshire border aka Burnley. At one stage I was even wishing that the Dingles would win a few games and survive just to break the seeming inevitable outcome. But a comical penalty miss and jangled own goal all within 50 seconds in the Turf Moor do-or-die clash with Leicester seems to suggest that my Blackburn Rovers will be playing them again next season. The fun and frolics at the bottom of the table are much more entertaining to behold than watching the rich kids at the top. Chelsea are boring. Fact. Piled with the dosh from a dodgy Russian, you would think they would manage to win the League with a touch of panache. But no… Jose Mourniho is becoming a self-parody and his team of continental mercenaries make Don Revie’s ruthless home-grown robotic assassins groomed within the Leeds United empire of the 1960s and 70s look like a bunch of gung-ho footballing cavaliers. Anyway, at least Watford and AFC Bournemouth can look forward to rubbing shoulders with the high and mighty come August. And probably getting stuffed every week. During my wayward travels as a permanently worried Blackburn Rovers fan, I have had little contact with Watford or the Cherries. I remember standing on an open end at Vicarage Road in January 1975 in our Third Division days as the rain poured down. There was nowhere to repel the elements as Rovers earned a goalless draw. I was drenched cos a Rovers scarf tied around your head does little to keep off a Hertfordshire version of a monsoon. And the rain was cold. I suppose I must have enjoyed the pint afterwards as I dried off. I recall Bournemouth becoming almost trendy in the early 70s as the changed their moniker from Bournemouth and Boscombe Athletic to AFC Bournemouth under the smooth, swarthy tutelage of future Clarets’ mentor John Bond. They had Ted MacDougall scoring goals for fun and seemed destined for great things. But it seems to have taken until now. My only visit to Dean Court was in September 2013 en route back to Adelaide from a working stint in London. Rovers were 3-0 up at half-time. Bournemouth were down to 10 men and I was looking forward to a cricket score. But to their credit, Bournemouth dug in and won the second half with a goal to keep things in check with a 3-1 margin. Perhaps it signalled a sign of the spirit that would fuel things to come. I wish both of the unlikely aspiring high-flyers all the best. Rovers, alas, are nowhere near. We bid farewell to David Dunn this weekend, a local lad who has been a great servant. But the Indian interlopers’ deeds as owners mean our future is clouded with uncertainty. We are not alone as foreign intruders muscle in and treat clubs that are part of their respective communities as playthings. The old terrace chant of “You don’t know what you’re doing” has never rung more true. Still, there’s always next season. We all live in hope.

Burnley may remain the enemy but Sean Dyche and his crew deserve promotion

I suppose congratulations are in order.  As a Blackburn Rovers’ diehard, it is through gritted teeth that I say ‘well done’ to Burnley on wrapping up promotion to the English Premier League.  The 2-0 home win by our former nemesis over Wigan Athletic  finally sealed a most unlikely happening.  At the start of the season,  the bookies’ odds were  favouring Burnley to be involved in a relegation dogfight rather than be pushing for a promotion place. So fair play to Sean Dyche and his tight-knit squad. The so-called “Ginger Mourinho”  has pulled off a minor miracle with a group  of players who were not even well known in Burnley last August. When they hit the top two in September, I mocked – as did many others – and felt it would be a temporary thing. The squad seemed too threadbare and it appeared inevitable that they would fall back into the pack once injuries started to bite. But that never happened and they just kept going. However, to my Claret chums back home such as Pete Stevenson, Malc Heyworth, Col Hollis, Richard Bennett (ex-drummer with The Wind) and the late great Adrian “Flec” Fletcher (who will  have been watching from above), I say enjoy it while you can. Those same bookies won’t get it wrong again next season. I should suspect they already have you locked in as relegation favourites.  Even as Danny Ings, the bloke who looks like Robbie Williams, and Sam Vokes kept scoring, there were signs of what may lie ahead. Dyche’s squad is so thin that he had to play a full-strength team against West Ham at Turf Moor in the League Cup.  Result – big Sam Allardyce’s “reserves” helped themselves to a 2-0 success. There may be more of that to come next season. But promotion has been earned on merit, galling as it has been for me to look on. Along the way you even managed to beat us at Ewood after umpteen years of failure.  How many of you have ever witnessed that before?  So it seems like it was all meant to be. Next season, unless Rovers achieve a far-fetched elevation via the play-offs,  we will kick off a term in a division below Burnley for the first time since 1975-76. That is 39 years. A virtual lifetime.  1976 – jeez, I was still a student then, the Sex Pistols were on the verge of discovery and the long, hot summer of that year in the UK is still talked about now  as if it was a major event. Anybody born in those years would now be approaching middle age. It’s like some mind-bending Doctor Who script which has all gone wrong. Again, it’s very tough to take.  Next season will also mark 20 years since Rovers’ Premiership triumph at the zenith of the Jack Walker era. As Kenny Dalglish, Alan Shearer and the rest were cavorting around Anfield with the trophy, bereft Burnley were on their way to being consigned to third tier football.  In many Rovers fans’ eyes, the Claret half of the great East Lancashire divide had become an irrelevance.  Where have those two decades disappeared to?  And how has the footballing landscape along the M65 changed so dramatically? Even with the chasm between the clubs, the lingering loathing remained.  Rovers fans would still sing anti-Burnley songs in such majestic footballing citadels as Old Trafford and Highbury.  A Kiwi mate of mine from the Daily Telegraph, Rod Carr, adopted Rovers as his team, probably cos of my constant prattling. At one away game –  Norwich City, if I recall correctly, – the usual Claret jibes  were being voiced.  Rod looked at me and simply said: “Relevance?”.   Rod now lives in Brazil so maybe he picked up the awful  Turf Moor tidings overnight and can reflect on how things can change.  I had to put up with watching a bit of the game on Setanta. When Burnley took the lead, it was time for kip for me. Then this morning I woke for Gabs’ early shift to find the promotion story on mainstream Aussie TV sports feeds.  I’m afraid 7am is a bit early for me. The sight of the infantile mascot Bertie Bee and Claret ne’re-do-wells  invading the pitch made me feel nauseous. I bought Setanta to watch the odd Rovers game after our Premiership demise. Yet this season, we have been on precisely twice, both times against Burnley. In recent weeks, the channel has virtually turned into Clarets TV.  They  have had games on against Leicester City, Middlesbrough (both losses, ha, ha), Blackpool and then Wigan. They are even gonna be featured again against Ipswich Town on Saturday. I have watched the games fleetingly but the situation has become insufferable. Up until last night, though, there seemed to be plenty of empty seats for the Turf Moor clashes. Not a good look. The derby at Blackpool was dire. But there is nothing wrong with winning ugly when promotion is your aim. To escape from the Championship, where everybody can beat everybody else,  is like trying to free yourself from a cunningly constructed spider’s web.  So those from the dark side of Pendle Hill, the witch country of Demdike and Chattox centuries ago, are back in the limelight. For now…  I will be sneaking a peek to check on the fortunes of the Anti-Christs aka the Claret clowns.  After all, Burnley’s result has always been the next one I look for after either walking off a Rovers game live or finding the outcome while living in Oz. A lot can happen over the summer months.  If Dyche is so revered, maybe bigger clubs will come calling. Remember Owen Coyle? And there is suddenly a vacancy at Old Trafford. Only kiddin’ . Enjoy the moment you lot of the Claret persuasion.  Last time you reached the promised land of the Premiership, it all ended in tears. So at least you should  know what to expect.  Be seeing you…