talkSPORT analysts Simon Jordan & Martin O’Neill go into great detail on Burnley’s problems

admin | November 7, 2023 | Other Clubs | No Comments

talkSPORT pundits Martin O’Neill and Simon Jordan have embarked on a deep dive into Burnley’s woes at the start of the season.

The Clarets sit second bottom in the league table on just four points from their first 11 games, above bottom side Sheffield United on goal difference only.

It comes after Vincent Kompany’s side suffered a sixth straight home defeat on Saturday with a 2-0 reversal at the hands of Crystal Palace.

Kicking off the debate, O’Neill suggested Burnley’s style of play – which has resulted in several costly mistakes leading to opposition goals – could be the crux of their problem.

“They’re aren’t too many teams in European football that can play out from the back. But that doesn’t mean you have to flog it up the pitch every time,” he explained.

“It’s easy enough to look like you’re trying to play the ball out from the back because now the rules have changed, when the goalkeeper takes a kick out you put two boys either side of him like two centuries guarding something.

“You can actually pretend in this day and age you’re playing out from the back, but don’t keep losing the ball consistently when you’re doing that and eventually it’s going to cost you.

“Vincent mentioned something about putting your hands on the fire and burning and not doing it again, but mistakes do cost you games. They do cost you close to your goal, they cost you further up the pitch and at the end of the day, you have to learn and you have to learn relatively quickly.

“The three promoted teams are all down there but while there’s another team still in the mix like Bournemouth, you’ll feel like you have a chance of doing it.

“What you don’t want is the other teams like Fulham and Crystal Palace, that you might think might drop in, you don’t want them to get too far away.

“Nottingham Forest just won, Everton just won, so now you’re starting to think it’s three from four. But while you’re one of those three sides, you’ll still think you can make it.”

The former Aston Villa and Celtic boss was then asked if he thinks Burnley’s style of play could be their undoing this season.

O’Neill added: “It’s commendable [the way they play]. Everyone hates this word ‘pragmatic’, people do because they think it means a change of philosophy.

“But you can still have a philosophy, but you actually eradicate some of the mistakes you make because at the moment they’re self-imposed, self-inflicted.

“You can still have your philosophy of playing and it would be great to see that happen, it would be great to see them stay up if that was the case.”

Fellow pundit Simon Jordan also weighed in, suggesting Kompany isn’t in “control” of the situation as he might let on.

“I’m looking at the table and thinking about my observation that the three promoted teams will go down, but I’m also looking at Bournemouth and thinking ‘these lot are all over the place’.

“The manager is not having the impact Bill Foley [owner] thought, so he’s likely to be handed his walking papers sooner rather than later, and it might be a case that Bournemouth gives one of them a pass.

“Right now Vincent Kompany is brilliantly media-facing and says the things that make him sound like he’s got control of the situation.

“But when you’ve got four points from 11 games in the Premier League and you’re not winning at home, you haven’t got control of the situation.

“You may be gaining a foothold and you may be seeing more in your performances and you might take the compliments from Roy Hodgson and think that’s wonderful, but Roy wouldn’t have said that if it had been a 0-0 draw or had he lost 1-0.

“You can always be generous when you’ve walked away and thought ‘blimey, this was a smash and grab’.”