Do we still attribute ‘Europe’ to our poor start to the season?

jdrobbo · Post by **jdrobbo** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:12 pm

At tea time on Thursday, Olympiakos play Dynamo Kiev in the Round of 32 in the Europa League. It makes me think of ‘What might’ve been’ after we simply outplayed the Greeks for 90 minutes on the Turf.

So now we’ve seemingly turned a corner (but maintaining the notion that we’re certainly not out of the woods), do we still blame European football for the loss of ‘everything Burnley’ at the start of the season?

Was it because everything was so different? Was it that, to coin a Dycheism, fans and players weren’t aligned, with many pockets of our fanbase wanting slightly different things? Was it the heavy squad rotation, which included dropping some of those who fought so hard to get us into Europe in the first instance? Was it purely down to team selection, of which the goalkeeper must come into question? Maybe it was a combination of several things.

I’m just glad that we appear to have got our Burnley back. Having said all that...a last 32 match against the likes of Dynamo Kiev, Lazio, Benfica, Celtic, Rennes or Napoli (for old time’s sake) really would’ve wet the appetite for the lot of us, I suspect!

UTC

Funkydrummer · Post by **Funkydrummer** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:18 pm

"Having said all that...a last 32 match against the likes of Dynamo Kiev, Lazio, Benfica, Celtic, Rennes or Napoli (for old time’s sake) really would’ve wet the appetite for the lot of us, I suspect!"

I think we would be up sh!t creek if we were still involved with that lot tbh.

Best shut imo.

dougcollins · Post by **dougcollins** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:18 pm

Directly or indirectly, yes.

summitclaret · Post by **summitclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:22 pm

It's as simple as we did not set out to take it seriously. I don't have a problem with that. I still have a problem with not strengthening wide and cm. But for McNeil we would probably be in a serious mess now. Did we really know how good he was or have we been very lucky?

Vino blanco · Post by **Vino blanco** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:35 pm

Yes, I think it did. When we qualified for Europe I said we now needed at least 4 or 5 better quality players to meet the demands. We didn't sign them and we have suffered .

bobinho · Post by **bobinho** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:40 pm

I do, yes.

Not because they were tired, but I think the players that earned their shot at the big time were sulking at not getting the chance they'd earned.

South West Claret. · Post by **South West Claret.** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:43 pm

No I think not having Tom Heaton in goal barking orders at our defence, also the inclusion of Dwight McNeil.

Bosscat · Post by **Bosscat** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:50 pm

South West Claret. wrote:No I think not having Tom Heaton in goal barking orders at our defence, also the inclusion of Dwight McNeil.

Ditto

Vino blanco · Post by **Vino blanco** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:52 pm

Plus, we started the season with Lennon as a guaranteed starter (a waste of space in my opinion) and if my memory serves me right, we also had Hendrick in his famous number 10 role for quite a few games.

summitclaret · Post by **summitclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:57 pm

South West Claret. wrote:No I think not having Tom Heaton in goal barking orders at our defence, also the inclusion of Dwight McNeil.

Tom was out all of last season. I do think Pope's injury was significant. Brought back too soon from his holiday.

We knew defour and brady were out and jbg had been in Russia also. How on earth we thought we could cope I will never know.

Royboyclaret · Post by **Royboyclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:00 pm

bobinho wrote:I do, yes.

Not because they were tired, but I think the players that earned their shot at the big time were sulking at not getting the chance they'd earned.

And to be fair, bobinho, who can blame them ?

Same with us supporters, is there a Burnley fan amongst us that would not prefer to be involved in the latter stages of the Europa League ?

But it was never part of the long-term plan, although no-one is telling me that Dyche would not have preferred success in this competition to be part of his cv. Same with the players.

Silkyskills1 · Post by **Silkyskills1** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:05 pm

I suppose it depends on how far into the season our 'poor start' extends. I always consider when the clocks go back as being the end of early season and we were definitely struggling then but that trend continued right up to and including Boxing Day. Some indifferent performances and some calamitous performances in that period of time couldn't all be aportioned to our Europa league disappointment. Very much in the same way that our improvement in form can't all be down to the recall of Tom Heaton in goal. Whatever the other factors are I just hope they continue a little longer.

longside72 · Post by **longside72** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:10 pm

Perfect time to attract 'better quality' players , we didn't , we've suffered .

RMutt · Post by **RMutt** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:18 pm

I would hate to think our players were ‘sulking’. In fact I cannot really believe they were but then it’s been known before at Chelsea and United. I don’t think it was the Europa League either. I think it might be something much more simple. Having played the safety first way, keep possession, turn back to your own goal if needed, Dyche realised it wasn’t working and threw caution to the wind. Instead we changed to a team who’s first thought was to go forward not back. Of course we were helped in this by the inclusion of McNeil. I think the confidence came back when it worked and the defence, helped by Heaton, realised games were worth fighting for because we were winning.

bfcjg · Post by **bfcjg** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:33 pm

In a sense yes because that's how Pope got injured and we ended up with Hart.

CrosspoolClarets · Post by **CrosspoolClarets** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:48 pm

The sulking argument makes a lot of sense. Dyche spoke about how it is hard to “go again” after finishing 7th, but surely leaving out the stars for the exciting, novel Europa fixtures would make that psychology worse? It would feel they were denied their reward and then are being asked to dig in again straight after. It was a huge, huge mistake in a football sense, regardless of our desire as fans to have a crack at it.

So yes, I still attribute it, but not for the reasons some do.

bfcmik · Post by **bfcmik** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 8:58 pm

I don't believe the players were sulking as such. Our performance at Southampton in the 1st PL game was decent. Then we came so close to a good result at home to Olympiakos - if Sam's early header had gone in I think we would have battered them.

Ben Mee, I think, was disgruntled and/or disheartened that his dream move to one of the big 6 didn't happen and it has taken a few months for him to get his head back. Tarky didn't really get his groin fixed after the hols and that restricted his ability to cope with the poor support offered by his fellow centre back. The rest, in my opinion, were disappointed not to progress and that just hit their confidence a bit too much to allow them, and us, to survive in the PL.

We do seem to be a team who go on good runs when the confidence is flowing and then awful runs when the confidence takes a hit. We have been like this for years.

bobinho · Post by **bobinho** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 9:07 pm

Royboyclaret wrote:And to be fair, bobinho, who can blame them ?

Same with us supporters, is there a Burnley fan amongst us that would not prefer to be involved in the latter stages of the Europa League ?

But it was never part of the long-term plan, although no-one is telling me that Dyche would not have preferred success in this competition to be part of his cv. Same with the players.

No, can’t blame them, they’d earned it. And they weren’t given a chance. As far as Dyche is concerned, I think having that on the cv would be quite superb. Having it on the cv next to PL relegation would’ve been at the forefront of his mind I think.

We’d all love to be in it, but NOT at the cost of our PL life. UEFA is an adventure. PL is our future. We need it if we want to be more than league one also rans.

littlemissclaret · Post by **littlemissclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 10:30 pm

I'd be really interested to see Cork's running stats pre and post boxing day. Can we get this?

Tricky Trevor · Post by **Tricky Trevor** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 10:35 pm

Definitely a yes from me. For all SD says the PL is our be all and end all he swapped things around and messed players about.
As one who was dead against our Europe adventure, we just didn’t have the squad. I wish he had played a complete second X1 for both legs against Aberdeen.

Bin Ont Turf · Post by **Bin Ont Turf** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 10:40 pm

summitclaret wrote:It's as simple as we did not set out to take it seriously.

I'm still struggling with this 'thinking'.

In fact if you look at the players we put out and how we played, then you have to say that the 'thinking' is a load of b0llocks.

Quickenthetempo · Post by **Quickenthetempo** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 10:57 pm

Europe could be blamed for interupting pre season but not to the extent of how bad our start was.
Injuries, out of form players and Dyche's pig headedness are far bigger factors.

Leisure · Post by **Leisure** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:05 pm

bobinho wrote:No, can’t blame them, they’d earned it. And they weren’t given a chance. As far as Dyche is concerned, I think having that on the cv would be quite superb. Having it on the cv next to PL relegation would’ve been at the forefront of his mind I think.

We’d all love to be in it, but NOT at the cost of our PL life. UEFA is an adventure. PL is our future. We need it if we want to be more than league one also rans.

Exactly.

Royboyclaret · Post by **Royboyclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:11 pm

Leisure wrote:Exactly.

But why did it have to be one, to the exclusion of the other ?

Surely wins breed momentum, irrespective of which competition it happens to be.

Harry Potts would never have played a weakened side in European competition.

Bin Ont Turf · Post by **Bin Ont Turf** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:23 pm

Royboyclaret wrote:
Harry Potts would never have played a weakened side in European competition.

Weakened side?

8 of the players who have been starting on this run that we've had, started against Olympiacos at home.

2 more came on later as sub. So the only one who was missing was Tarky who was coming back from an injury I think.

For me the manager and players took it seriously, and if we had have trounced Olympiacos like we should have done, then this wouldn't have even been a discussion.

ClaretLoup · Post by **ClaretLoup** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:26 pm

Royboyclaret wrote:
Harry Potts would never have played a weakened side in European competition.

Ironically Harry played a weakened side in the league prior to a European Cup tie. However you of all people should know that the finances have completely altered since the Potts era and that the club's current success is dependent on Premier League survival. So in all probability Potts would have done the same as Sean as he was completely beholden to the Board as well.

Bin Ont Turf · Post by **Bin Ont Turf** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:30 pm

The chopping and changing of the side was one of the main factors for me.

A lot of the chopping and changing wasn't due to injuries.

Royboyclaret · Post by **Royboyclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:32 pm

ClaretLoup wrote:Ironically Harry played a weakened side in the league prior to a European Cup tie. However you of all people should know that the finances have completely altered since the Potts era and that the club's current success is dependent on Premier League survival. So in all probability Potts would have done the same as Sean as he was completely beholden to the Board as well.

Ah, so we're back to PL survival at all costs argument. Another £120m to be prioritised.

No wonder the directors were saying at the airport the sooner we're out of this the better.

SGr · Post by **SGr** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:37 pm

No not for me.

Maybe prior to the Bournemouth game but we did look to have turned things around a touch during that and the gritty win at Cardiff. But then we nosedived again. The poor “start” was a poor entire first half of the season. Getting tonked 5-1 at home by an unimpressive Everton occurred about 4 months after Europe ended.

For me, recruitment remains the factor behind the whole issue.

CrosspoolClarets · Post by **CrosspoolClarets** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:38 pm

The club’s current success is NOT dependent on Premier League survival.

We were after all relegated twice. On both occasions we bounced back during the parachute payment period.

For those clubs who did survive for a bit whilst making no serious attempt to win a trophy or progress in Europe - where are they now?

Success in 50 years will be judged by what is on the honours board, and notable scalps especially European ones (so the capital punishment league cup run, for example, will be judged as one of our successes). When I say goodbye to this Earth in what I very much hope will be 50 years, that’s what I want to look back on, not a sequence of lower half finishes.

SGr · Post by **SGr** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:41 pm

summitclaret wrote:It's as simple as we did not set out to take it seriously. I don't have a problem with that. I still have a problem with not strengthening wide and cm. But for McNeil we would probably be in a serious mess now. Did we really know how good he was or have we been very lucky?

For me there’s actually a large amount of luck in this. McNeil is part of what we’ve been crying out for for a long time, and we’ve managed to find him within our youth team.

Would January have been all too different without McNeil’s emergence? Not for me. We couldn’t bring in that calibre of player in summer when we were at our strongest, so I dont trust for a second that we’d have done it then.

SGr · Post by **SGr** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:47 pm

Dyche reading this board and thinking 5-3-2 with two target men and no wingers was a good idea has to be another factor

ClaretLoup · Post by **ClaretLoup** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:47 pm

So there you go. Potts did what the Board told him to do. So if he was running the team now instead of Dyche he would have played a weakened team in the Europa League exactly as he did vs Chelsea to increase Burnley's chances of progressing in European Cup which was a real moneyspinner back in the day. Do you think he decided that himself?

Royboyclaret · Post by **Royboyclaret** » Tue Feb 12, 2019 11:53 pm

ClaretLoup wrote:So there you go. Potts did what the Board told him to do. So if he was running the team now instead of Dyche he would have played a weakened team in the Europa League exactly as he did vs Chelsea to increase Burnley's chances of progressing in European Cup which was a real moneyspinner back in the day. Do you think he decided that himself?

Fair point.

I remember not long ago being castigated on here for suggesting Dyche was merely an employee of the Club.

Colburn_Claret · Post by **Colburn_Claret** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 7:46 am

It's rarely one thing, normally a combination of factors, but Europe was definitely one of them, probably the biggest.

Stalbansclaret · Post by **Stalbansclaret** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 7:47 am

Some managerial geniuses on this thread seemingly believing it would be possible for the same team to play Thursday nights (in the likes of Istanbul and Athens) and Sunday afternoons every week. Curse Dyche for all that “chopping and changing” eh !
We didn’t recruit anywhere near well enough, compounded by injuries and lacked a coping strategy. The replacement of Hart by Heaton and Lennon by McNeill represents colossal upgrade in effectiveness and both full back positions have come on leaps and bounds as Charlie has developed and Bardsley been reborn !

Bosscat · Post by **Bosscat** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 8:23 am

I see this thread has given the "Dyche Out" brigade something to whine about at last....

It is "so last year" people......
Forget it ... we are on a good run enjoy it now and forget our little European Tour (however brief it was)...

Bring on the "Spuds" a week on Saturday and lets raise the roof at t'Turf

Come on you Clarets

AlargeClaret · Post by **AlargeClaret** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 8:29 am

Had very very little to do with our poor start . Sure its tricky to get players match fit for an earky euro campaign but we used our squad . Basically we’re “ sh1t” with a hotch potch of champ players and a great manager who manages to squeezes every ounce out of them.
Worth noting we started season laden with injuries and continued our very poor late previous season form

claretonthecoast1882 · Post by **claretonthecoast1882** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 8:33 am

No there were several factors to our poor start, the resident experts on here told us weekly.

Dyche was no longer committed to his job due to signing a long term contract and was now set for life, the same ones also used to claim he wasn't committed as he only signed 1 year deals.
Ben Mee didn't care, as he too signed for more money after not getting the move he wanted all summer, he too wasn't arsed. The whole squad were sulking due to signing Joe Hart (while having both other keepers injured as it meant their mate couldn't play)
Hendrick was s**t, Westwood playing was a backward step. Bardsley was too old and only signed for the dressing room. Taylor was s**t.
Defour was injured. Wood was s**t.
There are probably many more our whoppers have used as an excuse for a side out of form and low on confidence, oddly they have gone quiet of late.

ŽižkovClaret · Post by **ŽižkovClaret** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 8:46 am

Without Europe, Pope may not have been injured. As a result, we wouldnt have signed Hart, and therefore Heaton would have played sooner.

So yes

Quickenthetempo · Post by **Quickenthetempo** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:03 am

ZizkovClaret wrote:Without Europe, Pope may not have been injured. As a result, we wouldnt have signed Hart, and therefore Heaton would have played sooner.

So yes

Heaton got injured himself at the start of the season and took a while to get fully fit.

Pope would of been first choice regardless without his injury.

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:19 am

Funkydrummer wrote:"Having said all that...a last 32 match against the likes of Dynamo Kiev, Lazio, Benfica, Celtic, Rennes or Napoli (for old time’s sake) really would’ve wet the appetite for the lot of us, I suspect!"

I think we would be up sh!t creek if we were still involved with that lot tbh.

Best shut imo.

But are any of those teams any better than United, who we should have beat on their own ground but for 3 (yes three including the 5 minutes injury time from nowhere) refereeing decisions?

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:24 am

dougcollins wrote:Directly or indirectly, yes.

Indirectly or otherwise, I am still of the opinion that Dyche totally demotivated the players by dropping them for the Euro games after they had worked their backsides off to get us there. Nothing will ever change my opinion on that and I can never forgive the way he treated the competition with such disdain.

Dyche is a great manager and I'm glad he's here, he's got us through a rocky patch and hopefully it's onwards and upwards but that stupid decision to drop players for the Euros backfired on him and I believe got us into the mess in the first place. Hopefully he will never do that again.

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:25 am

bobinho wrote:I do, yes.

Not because they were tired, but I think the players that earned their shot at the big time were sulking at not getting the chance they'd earned.

Absolutely this. I still can't understand why others cannot see this.

thatdberight · Post by **thatdberight** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:27 am

No. I attribute it to having finished 7th last season.

Hipper · Post by **Hipper** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:33 am

I suggest two factors.

Firstly, for the second half of last season our form was poor, mostly since the injuries to Defour and Brady. This continued into the new season.

Secondly, the club's, and Dyche's, lack of experience of dealing with such an early (July) competitive start, particularly through the training build up to the new season. For example, the friendlies we had arranged were similar to the previous season but ended up a chore that he didn't really seem to want to play. It would have been sensible to seek advice from the likes of Roy Hodgson or David Moyes as to how to do this. Whether he did or not I can't say but it doesn't look like it.

Lesson's learned I hope.

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:36 am

bfcmik wrote:I don't believe the players were sulking as such. Our performance at Southampton in the 1st PL game was decent. Then we came so close to a good result at home to Olympiakos - if Sam's early header had gone in I think we would have battered them.

Ben Mee, I think, was disgruntled and/or disheartened that his dream move to one of the big 6 didn't happen and it has taken a few months for him to get his head back. Tarky didn't really get his groin fixed after the hols and that restricted his ability to cope with the poor support offered by his fellow centre back. The rest, in my opinion, were disappointed not to progress and that just hit their confidence a bit too much to allow them, and us, to survive in the PL.

We do seem to be a team who go on good runs when the confidence is flowing and then awful runs when the confidence takes a hit. We have been like this for years.

I agree with a lot of this. I do believe they were 'sulking' though but not like some kid who hasn't got his own way, they were probably seriously p!ssed off with Dyche at preventing them from showing off in Europe after a great campaign to get us there, and understandably so, I would have been also.

I know a lot on here think otherwise but they should ask thenselves this, if you have just played a long hard season and got us to 7th place and in Europe and the manager, come Europe time, says 'sorry guys I want you for the PL' then drops you wouldn't you be gutted as well? I absolutely believe Dyche was the creator of our bad start (unintentionally of course) and I also hope that he might have learned something from it, although I'm not convinced about that because he's nothing if not stubborn.

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:38 am

bobinho wrote:No, can’t blame them, they’d earned it. And they weren’t given a chance. As far as Dyche is concerned, I think having that on the cv would be quite superb. Having it on the cv next to PL relegation would’ve been at the forefront of his mind I think.

We’d all love to be in it, but NOT at the cost of our PL life. UEFA is an adventure. PL is our future. We need it if we want to be more than league one also rans.

Oh good, so we throw away a Euro adventure to be PL also rans?

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:40 am

Tricky Trevor wrote:Definitely a yes from me. For all SD says the PL is our be all and end all he swapped things around and messed players about.
As one who was dead against our Europe adventure, we just didn’t have the squad. I wish he had played a complete second X1 for both legs against Aberdeen.

Nonsense. Is the limit of your ambition for the club to mess around the foot of the PL?

houseboy · Post by **houseboy** » Wed Feb 13, 2019 9:42 am

Royboyclaret wrote:But why did it have to be one, to the exclusion of the other ?

Surely wins breed momentum, irrespective of which competition it happens to be.

Harry Potts would never have played a weakened side in European competition.

True, there is NEVER an excuse for fielding weakened teams. I wish they still fined clubs heavilly for doing it.