Peacock-Farrell and Vydra take the international honours
Goalkeeper Bailey Peacock-Farrell is currently playing for Sheffield Wednesday on a season long loan, but he is one of six Burnley players who have been on international duty, and he grabbed the headlines in Northern Ireland’s two World Cup qualifiers.
BPF saved a penalty for Wednesday recently and did likewise in their 4-1 win against Lithuania. If that wasn’t enough, and of more importance, he saved another in their 0-0 draw against Switzerland as he took his total of caps to 26.
Monday saw Burnley fans tuning into YouTube to watch the Côte d’Ivoire v Cameroon. In an impressive looking stadium but on a pitch that looked worse than those I tried to play football on at places such as the Prairie in the 1970s, the interest was latest signing Maxwel Cornet whose Côte d’Ivoire team won 2-1.
Cornet is the latest Burnley player to make a full international appearance; that honour just days before had gone to Wayne Hennessey who came on as a half time substitute as Wales drew 0-0 in a friendly against Finland. He’s won 97 caps now; could he go on to emulate Gábor Király, the last goalkeeper we signed for Palace. When he hung up his gloves and trackie bottoms he’d won 108 caps for Hungary.
Jóhann Berg Guðmundsson didn’t play in Iceland’s friendly but did in their two World Cup qualifiers and captained his team too. Both games were at home in Reykjavik, but both ended in defeat. They lost 2-0 against Romania before being beaten 4-0 by Germany.
Nick Pope was back on England duty having missed the Euros but could do no more than watch with Jordan Pickford playing two of the games and Sam Johnstone having the quiet evening against Andorra. With England leading 1-0 in Poland, a game which ended in a 1-1 draw, a big Pickford error almost cost them a goal until it was cleared almost on the line. Was I the only Burnley fan willing it to go in.
Finally, our goalscoring international Matěj Vydra. He played in the Czech Republic’s two qualifiers, coming on as a substitute in their 1-0 win against Belarus and starting the 3-0 defeat against Belgium. They also played a friendly against Ukraine. Vydra came on as a substitute at half time and went on to score the only goal of the game in stoppage time.
Nine caps, and now all back at Gawthorpe except Peacock-Farrell who will be lining up for Sheffield Wednesday in their League One fixture at Plymouth tomorrow.
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