Yesterday I went out with ten other Clarets for a few beers just be sociable of course
Inevitably season tickets were discussed . I mention this because the investors just don’t get why everyone is concerned.
We talked about our worst ever season . 1986 /1987 was of course in the running
But let’s look at facts
That season we got 49 points
We won 12 games and drew 13
After 46 games we had a minus goal difference of 21

This season 4 wins,5 draws and already -34 goals

Yes the worst ever for me
It will be the biggest swing from last seasons points to this seasons
Most money we’ve ever spent on transfers
Most Money due in “loans”

You're also conveniently forgetting that the average age of the squad is significantly lower than I certainly can ever remember, we are playing in the best league in the world, have had rotten luck with injuries and decisions given against us at key moments and that we are still on a learning journey trying to shake off the "long ball merchants" label that we got under Sean Dyche.

I've followed us since 1990.

To even compare the club now to the 90's is mental. We are literally light years ahead in terms of quality. My lad was born in 2013. I can half understand him feeling this is the worst season in his lifetime. But if you watched us nearly go out the football league and cease to exist.... yet you feel this is the worst its got.... just wow.

I get there was a lot of expectation after last season. And I appreciate we've not got it right overall, but my word, the constant negativity on here is way way worse than going on the turf this season. I don't get it... its such a self fulfilling prophecy. Negativity breeds negativity.

I probably should just avoid this board tbf

The average age of the squad is one of the problems this season.

RammyClaret61 wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 8:54 am

The average age of the squad is one of the problems this season.

It might be a "problem" this season in terms of naivety, but most of those players are still learning and developing.

We will see the positives from this season in the years to come, but some people want instant success.

You're going on stats there though.
Nothing will beat 1986-87 for the worst season ever. We were nearly evicted from the football league & out of existence. This season is not even close to that

It's not over yet.

I don’t get satisfaction from watching us lose . I don’t go home thinking well that was satisfying because we’ve got younger players do you?

Perhaps in your opinion, but as others have said, we’ve been far worse in that time.

Even with all your points taken in, I'd say staying in the football league by 1 point is a far worse season than this one.

Nobody who went to Crewe last away game of 86/87 season and has been on this season will describe this season as the worst one ever.

We had crowds under 2000 for home games, we got hammered in the FA Cup 3-0 to a non league side, lost 6-0 at home to Hereford and stayed in the football league on the last day of the season.

ClaretInLeeds wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 8:57 am

It might be a "problem" this season in terms of naivety, but most of those players are still learning and developing.

We will see the positives from this season in the years to come, but some people want instant success.

I know that, but it’s this season we’re discussing. We just needed a little more experience.

I still maintain the 'worst season ever' tag applies to seasons like 1989-90 or 2005-6 where almost nothing seems to happen at all.

For results on the pitch and the point's we've picked up so far this is the worst season ever, but including everything else like being in the top flight of English football and the money the team and club is worth these day's and the match day experience there is tens of season's worst than this, the 1986/87 season being top of the list

I think the OP is discussing the “ worst season “ on a relative basis . It’s plain daft to compare a 3/4th div season v prem based on quality of players etc .
Though even the most deluded VK superfans who talk about “ squad age “ and “ learning “ would be hard pushed to not class this season ( thus far ) as one of the worst in living memory . Though it’s not totally over yet , a bit of crazy luck and back to back wins could galvanise us massively.

I kind of agree with Spike, I was there through the dark days of the 80’s but this season for me is the worst I’ve experienced as a fan.
The lack of knowledge in recruitment
The lack of attacking threat
The way our manager hasn’t learned from his mistakes
The way he has hung players out to dry
The way the ground feels when you turn up
The amount of money we have wasted on average players when we needed to get experience throughout the team.
This season has been a shambles from start to well it hasn’t finished yet but until now, makes it worse we are relying on teams being docked points rather than us winning points.

Give your head a wobble pal, we’re probably going to get relegated from the top league in the World to a league that’s in the top 10 with a chance to bounce straight back….in 1986/87 we nearly went out of business cos if we’d have lost to Orient we’d have folded…..we’re a million miles away from those dark days with some very talented young players on our books

It’s like everyone saying last season was the best season ever, I personally don,t think it was. Getting promoted through the leagues I thought every promotion season was equally as exciting but the best season was the season Coyle got us back in the Prem by a country mile. Good cup runs and a promotion at Wembley against all the odds what a great season.

Ahh, using the old Orient game as a barometer. Of course this isn't our worst ever season. But, after the highs of last season, I'd agree that this season has certainly been one of the most disappointing I can remember.

AlargeClaret wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 9:21 am

I think the OP is discussing the “ worst season “ on a relative basis . It’s plain daft to compare a 3/4th div season v prem based on quality of players etc .
Though even the most deluded VK superfans who talk about “ squad age “ and “ learning “ would be hard pushed to not class this season ( thus far ) as one of the worst in living memory . Though it’s not totally over yet , a bit of crazy luck and back to back wins could galvanise us massively.

Not a deluded VK superfan - just someone who understands what the club are trying to do in the long run whilst having an understanding of football.

clarets1978 wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 8:57 am

You're going on stats there though.
Nothing will beat 1986-87 for the worst season ever. We were nearly evicted from the football league & out of existence. This season is not even close to that

The 87 season is the most exaggerated season of all time.

I can understand at the time with the end of the world narrative as it was the first season teams were relegated and into the unknown, they had the same feeling in Lincoln...Lincoln came straight back up after being relegated. People who go on and on about 87 continue to not use the benefit of hindsight, the town of Burnley is simply too big to not have a football club.

In terms of wins, points and goals conceded this has been the worst season in the club's history.

Relative to the division we are playing in. This is the worst team I’ve seen since I’ve been watching in 1993.

The fact we saw fans and players dancing to Free From Desire after scraping a win against a 10-man Brentford at home goes to show how lame the club is at the moment.

getbennyon wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 10:00 am

The 87 season is the most exaggerated season of all time.

I can understand at the time with the end of the world narrative as it was the first season teams were relegated and into the unknown, they had the same feeling in Lincoln...Lincoln came straight back up after being relegated. People who go on and on about 87 continue to not use the benefit of hindsight, the town of Burnley is simply too big to not have a football club.

In terms of wins, points and goals conceded this has been the worst season in the club's history.

I am going to guess that you weren't around for that season, most people who weren't have this tone.

claretonthecoast1882 wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 10:02 am

I am going to guess that you weren't around for that season, most people who weren't have this tone.

I went to every game home and away season 1986\87

I've been watching Burnley since 1997. I've seen much, much, much worse than this. Not much more to add

We haven't only got a very young squad that will not get much younger next season as a couple of older heads get replaced but we have a very young manager who is also being hung out to dry. Let's just support them all. As a fan I like to think that we are all in this together, probably why I don't feel disconnected.

I understand what the club is trying to do, it’s trying to harp back to the past by developing players and moving them on for profit to keep the club sustainable for the future. But you can’t go from an OAP squad to a nappy squad as quickly as we have. We should have built on our success last season brought in 2 or 3 players with Prem quality and experience to help nurture the young players through. We have been naive this season and hopefully the club have learnt a lot from their mistakes, you can’t overall teams year in year out and start a fresh you need some continuity and experience. From all the players we have purchased this season who do you think we will make a profit on? I can only think of maybe 1 or 2 players and the profit will be minimal after a record outlay.

Not even close.
It would be a bit cruel to mention some of the absolute dross I have to watch don a claret and blue shirt down the years.
Travelling to the likes of Scarborough to be 3-0 down after 15 minutes or getting beat by Telford in the cup. Or even stood on the longside as Hereford beat us 6-0 in front of a virtually empty stadium.

As said not fair to mention players because it’s not really their fault that we signed them. But I’ll make an exception for one of them.
Nick Pickering…..

Debate over

True and I feel like we should wait 5 years before we make hard and fast judgements on this group of players. Some of them may surprise us. 12 months ago lots of fans were judging and now have changed their m8nds on several players especially our central defenders.

I've been pinching myself for over a decade about how well we are doing.

We are in the top 20 of the best clubs in England.

I would rather win 1 game in 10 against some of the best clubs in the World than win 9 out of 10 against clubs no one has ever heard of out of this country in the lower leagues.

Depends on your perspective I suppose.

Getting relegated from the top flight will never come close to being as bad as the seasons we had no hope of ever being there.

claptrappers_union wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 10:02 am

Relative to the division we are playing in. This is the worst team I’ve seen since I’ve been watching in 1993.

The fact we saw fans and players dancing to Free From Desire after scraping a win against a 10-man Brentford at home goes to show how lame the club is at the moment.

I tend to agree. When you think of the way we got promoted and months of planning we had this season has been a disaster.
When you know you're crap and skint the dissapointment isn't the same. And glad it wasn't just me who didn't agree with the likes of Assignon dancing around like we'd won the league last weekend

I think you've got to factor in where we were potentially heading at the end of the 87 season and where we're heading now. Where we're going to be next season isn't where any of us wanted to be or envisaged being, but it's still a whole lot better and in 1987 we'd have given anything for that. Having said that, statistically still the worst season ever sadly and I'm 66 in a few weeks, which us possibly why I'm uncharacteristically philosophical about it's all.

The only reason this season has been so frustrating to me is that I believed that the manager wasn't picking anywhere near close to the best possible XI for large parts of the season and left holes in the squad in the transfer window yet purchased players for big money in positions/roles we didn't really need.

Yes long term signing young players should be a priority, but crikey, you have to think at least a little bit about the here and now.

I think th op means relatively to where we are and how we are doing/expecting.
Will this season be the worst point return in a division for us?

Might be worst points tally ( still might not) we may have a great escape as unlikely as that is,however the dark days were just that. I remember the humiliation of being relegated to division 4 and the embarrassing period that followed to counter negative thoughts about this season.

The “young players” argument isn’t a valid excuse for failure.

We chose to sign them all and play them all, which has proved to be a disaster, and someone should be falling on their sword for that call.

alboclaret wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 12:55 pm

I think th op means relatively to where we are and how we are doing/expecting.
Will this season be the worst point return in a division for us?

1970-71 must be a good one to look at for that. Our top scorer that season had 5 goals

In terms of results 1979 /80 was a poor season our first win didn't come while late November 5-3 against 9 man Cambridge Utd. And only won 5 more games all season ending in relegation to the old 3rd division for the first time in our history

The only merit of the 1986/87 season is that it ended (I should stop the sentence there really!) on an extreme high with the Orient win and all the relief it gave us. I think that was the highest I ever felt as a Burnley fan after being pushed to lows unimaginable in past seasons (I stopped going pretty much after that). This despite watching most of the successes of 'The Team of the Seventies'.

I'm pretty disinterested generally these days but I find it hard to believe that any such highs will occur this season. Mind you I never thought it would happen in 86/87 either......

7 wins and 13 draws in the 1970/71 season. The major plus point was that the horse bothered were relegated to the third division as well that season.

1979/80 for me. We won the Anglo Scottish Cup the season before beating some Glasgow side on the way. Why it was diastrous was we were not that bad and were full of hope going into the season. 86/87 we had been on the downward slide since John Bond and we were poor very poor. This season is disappointing and strange decisions have been made but we are still at the top table with a chance of coming back. When we were relegated in 1980 it felt like the end. My pragmatic view is a la Dark Cloud, age helps your approach.

1979/80 for me. We won the Anglo Scottish Cup the season before beating some Glasgow side on the way. Why it was diastrous was we were not that bad and were full of hope going into the season. 86/87 we had been on the downward slide since John Bond and we were poor very poor. This season is disappointing and strange decisions have been made but we are still at the top table with a chance of coming back. When we were relegated in 1980 it felt like the end. My pragmatic view is a la Dark Cloud, age helps your approach.

clarets1978 wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 2:04 pm

1970-71 must be a good one to look at for that. Our top scorer that season had 5 goals

Have we beat that yet. No sure what forster is on.

Spike wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 8:45 am

Yesterday I went out with ten other Clarets for a few beers just be sociable of course
Inevitably season tickets were discussed . I mention this because the investors just don’t get why everyone is concerned.
We talked about our worst ever season . 1986 /1987 was of course in the running
But let’s look at facts
That season we got 49 points
We won 12 games and drew 13
After 46 games we had a minus goal difference of 21

This season 4 wins,5 draws and already -34 goals

Yes the worst ever for me
It will be the biggest swing from last seasons points to this seasons
Most money we’ve ever spent on transfers
Most Money due in “loans”

Nowhere near our worst season, but certainly one of the most unenjoyable. I suppose its how you measure it.

I've thought we've been gone for a long time, and still think we're going down, BUT if we were lucky enough to get away with it I'm sure you'd change your mind quickly.

Both the football and the catering in the same season, I can see why so many are disappointed!

this season is just a crap season. Nothing more, nothing less.

clarets1978 wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 2:04 pm

1970-71 must be a good one to look at for that. Our top scorer that season had 5 goals

In 1970/71 we finished the season having scored 29 and conceded 63 goals in forty two matches having won 7 and drawn 13. As of today we have scored 29 and conceded 63 in 29 matches .

Spike said it was his worst season , he’s allowed an opinion.

Casper2 wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 21, 2024 5:37 pm

Spike said it was his worst season , he’s allowed an opinion.

Has anyone said he isn’t ?