Perfect Day
Photographer Unknown
‘You and three others can be the guest of Ian Woan and Sean Dyche at Turf Moor for a 2018/2019 Premier League match then have a beer with Ian and Sean afterwards’
I’m at Lord’s, the home of cricket on an early Thursday evening in October. Another summer’s promise is almost gone and this one has been truly spectacular. Under the autumnal canopy of the Nursery End, the huge marquee is playing host to a dinner in aid of Shooting Star Chase, a children’s hospice charity caring for babies, children and young people with life-limiting conditions, and their families.
Everyone is on their best behaviour, dressed to the nines, coiffed and smelling divine. And that’s only the men… I’m a guest at the table of one of my colleagues, quaffing Nyetimber and talking plausible bollocks - the lingua franca of Metropolitan Liggers the world over - to those unfortunate enough to be seated either side of me.
But there is a point to this which is to raise cash for Shooting Stars. Each table has a couple of iPads listing the various lots in the charity auction. I’m usually the poorest person in the room by quite some margin at these bashes, so the likes of the four week villa holiday in Maui for twelve complete with staff of 20, chauffeur-driven S Class Merc and Riva speedboat on call are all clearly out-of-bounds. I scan the silent auction items that are usually (just) within reach but wasn’t expecting any would include a visit Turf Moor.
The reserve bid was not insignificant but we are in St. John’s Wood, one of the few areas of London that is undeniably lovely and justifiably off-the-scale, bonkersly expensive. Looking round, I reason few - if any - of the other guests will want to travel the 225 miles to a rain-lashed corner of the Northwest so I might be in with a shot…
I show it to my colleague, Mike, who is that rarest of species: a Manchester United fan actually born within a few miles of Old Trafford. Like many of my contemporaries in the early-Autumn of their years who follow football a bit, he has an unabashed admiration for what Burnley has achieved and how Sean Dyche represents the club. He promptly agrees to share the bid, thus doubling the amount available to spend and encouraging a level of fiscal laxity that would make even a Labour Shadow Chancellor blush.
My opening bid is quickly beaten and a game of cat & mouse ensues. We’re now way beyond the limits we agreed and as seating plans are abandoned, everyone is air-kissing everyone else and Mike is nowhere to be seen as the clock ticks down to the close of the auction at 23:00. So I go off in search of him to see what he will stretch to. Meanwhile, the auction ends early and we’ve lost it.
Fuelled now by righteous indignation and industrial quantities of a good Kiwi Pinot Noir, we track down one of the organisers to have a good moan about the procedural failing. Suavely, he suggests he contacts Ian Woan to see if he will agree to donate two lots to the auction. Within days, Ian has said that if we match the winning bid and so double the amount raised for Shooting Star Chase, he will be pleased to oblige. So the chequebook comes out…
We request the Fulham game on the 12th January. This is before the various struggles after that emotional day at Leicester, the cruel defeats at Wembley and the Emirates and our reasoning was simply we wanted to see a game with a reasonable chance of success. Clearly, the significance of the fixture in terms of the looming relegation battle could not be predicted. So on an unseasonably mild Saturday, we sail up an unusually docile M6 to be guided into the car park at the ground.
As promised, an envelope with my name on it containing four tickets and passes to the Manager’s Lounge is at the reception of the James Hargreaves Stand. The first of many effortlessly charming Turf Moor hospitality staff escort us to our destination. Ian’s Dad makes himself known. A former professional footballer chalking up 289 league appearances and netting 140 goals in spells with Norwich City, Northampton Town and Crystal Palace, he introduces us to his daughter and family including an angelic, beautifully behaved, great-granddaughter.
As Sean Dyche observed later with characteristic understatement, the match itself was “an odd one”…Less than two minutes in and even from a vantage point over 120 yards away, the brilliance of the opening goal was indisputable but the immediate fightback by Burnley impressive.
After twenty minutes though, it became the gift that will continue to give to compilers of Pub Quizzes: “What is the name of the only team to have won a Premier League match without a single shot on target and why?”
But this is not a fair reflection on Burnley’s performance for the last forty minutes of the first half. The Chris Wood header that hit the post was close enough to be ‘on target’ for all but the strictest pedant and Jeff Hendricks’ deflected shot for the equaliser looked to be arcing goalwards. That said, it’s almost better that this match will be talked about in pubs on a Monday night, the length and breadth of the land from now until eternity, as rightful recompense for all the other incidents that never seem to go Burnley’s way.
So after a fretful second half with the ball run up to the corner flag by the Bob Lord Stand and the old Beehole End, the final whistle goes and the sense of relief in the lounge is palpable. The only light relief has been from the few Fulham supporters who made the trip and their petulant but amusing reworking of the Beach Boys classic Sloop John B to “You have to live here; we get to go home”; a small consolation for their long journey back to South West London.
After a swift pint (you don’t go thirsty in the Manager's Lounge…), we are escorted down to reception and then into the battleship grey, narrow corridors beneath the Cricket Field Stand. Military similes might be lazy but apposite in this context as it really is like being in the bowels of a warship; the exposed brickwork, ducting, pipework and odd noises coming from all directions.
Ian Woan greets us shortly in a lounge adjacent to the dressing room. No longer in pitch-side attire but immaculately suited & booted and with a distinctly military bearing, he takes us on a tour.
“Hang on,” he says, “I best check there’s no naked footballers wandering around” and goes in to the home dressing room to check before ushering us in. “Thank you” declaims my eighty-year-old mum “as I shouldn’t like that at all!”, perhaps a tad unconvincingly. Amidst the carpet of identical, discarded flip-flops and tufts of expensive Desso-based grass that grace the floor, a fully-dressed James Tarkowski is the only one left. He modestly accepts Mike’s compliments on the superb match he has had and gamely poses for a photo. Sam Voke’s shirt is retrieved from the laundry skip as a souvenir for Mike’s daughter, having previously nominated him to Ian as her favourite Claret.
As Ian strides briskly around, every staff member is acknowledged and - impressively - he knows them all by name. All sport Burnley colours worked into the uniform consistent with their responsibilities. It reminds me of the oft-quoted John F Kennedy anecdote about his visit to NASA in the early 1960s. Spotting a bloke with a broom and oblivious to the visual clue this provided, he asked him what his job was: “I’m working to put a man on the moon” came the reply. The same sense of shared purpose is in evidence here.
We walk down the tunnel and look up at the ghostly stands. A daylight-simulating lighting rig is trained on a section of the pitch, making amends for a total lack of the real thing on what - even by Burnley standards - has been a truly awful afternoon weather-wise. Tom Heaton is making his way to the Player’s Lounge and grins as he endures a light ribbing as any prodigiously talented athlete might get - just to make sure he doesn’t get too full of himself - from a strict but proud Sports Master.
Back in the lounge, Sean Dyche comes in to say hello after fulfilling his various media and other commitments. Given the critical nature of this fixture and the relentless media glare he must be in, it was very gracious of him to spare the time and chat unguardedly.
I’m pleased to report he’s the same, normal decent bloke face-to-face as he is when grilled by Saint Gary every Saturday. Surprisingly softly spoken, the volume and tone might be turned down a notch or two but the copper-bottomed integrity that makes him so popular with pundits and supporters of every hue is evident. But how does he and Burnley FC attract positive sentiment across such a cross-section without appearing to try?
There’s a forgotten world somewhere out there: of Sunday morning games played with heavy, scuffed, dew-sodden balls amidst fallen autumn leaves; goals without nets; church bells ringing; being yelled at for turning your back on the ball. Of blue frozen legs, numb fingers, sucking on an orange segment at half time and being the subject of that most wounding of similes from the manager; that of playing like “a big girl’s blouse”.
Burnley, helmed by Sean Dyche and Ian Woan are the Premierships’ last remaining link with this disappearing world and why they are held in such high esteem by those of us of a certain age, as these precious memories flicker from view. Few of their contemporaries provide a link to this heritage and suffer by comparison, regardless of their achievements.
Similarly, the players exude a degree of hard work and diligent practice. I’m always reminded that the very best footballer at my school (he was brilliant, could win a match on his own) turned professional but only ever played in the Reserves of a Fourth Division team. Every one of Burnley’s first team squad players is therefore exceptional otherwise they would never have made it to this grade, but none seem to have any discernible diva tendencies. Working on the fringes of advertising and media, I know many divas with no discernible talent whatsoever, so the low-key commitment of the squad is impressive and testimony to the presiding culture. But leaving such mawkish sentiment aside, Burnley is probably more relevant to more people who follow football than any other team in the Premiership right now.
Faced with difficult situations in our personal or professional lives, few of us can just throw money at a problem to make it go away. We have to work as hard as we can with what we’ve got, to get the best result we can.
Burnley Football Club is the same, developing talent rather than buying it and recognising the skill and experience that seasoned but low-profile professionals bring to the mix. Although Francis Ford Coppola may have quipped that “to live within your means implies a lack of imagination” he clearly never had to put a team together to tussle with one assembled from the fortunes of variegated provenance that fuel the soulless leviathans of the Premiership. To compete against these resources is pointless as - ironically in the terms of this article - was proven by Fulham. The team who fought hard to get them into the Premiership was ruthlessly sidelined during the summer of 2018 while £100 million was splurged on hired guns. Seven of the gilded newcomers were in the team that managed to score three times yet lose at Turf Moor. To play poker in the Premier League, you need much deeper pockets than this and to try to compete on these terms is pointless. Burnley’s management appears to recognise this and sensibly don’t enter the fray.
Nope. I’ll take Burnley just as they are. Win or lose, that’s not really the point although winning is much the preferred option. My mother has lived in Derby for forty-two years but can’t summon up much affection for Derby County, even with the admirable Frank Lampard in charge. A driver from the local cab firm she uses is appalled that his Derby-born sons support Man U. “You support the team where you’re born. That’s it!” he claims and he’s right.
Team and management may no longer be recruited from the surrounding area; that’s gone for good and a good thing too. The influx of foreign talent over the last forty years has brought with it dazzling skills and technique. This has forced clubs to look far and wide for the best in their particular sector of the market. But Burnley as a unit look like they might be made of those same “best players from school “ and this adds to the general appeal of the Turf Moor setup.
Mellivora capensis is also known as a ‘Honey Badger’ is widely distributed in Africa, Southwest Asia, and the Indian subcontinent. Because of its wide range and occurrence in a variety of habitats, it is primarily a carnivorous species and has few natural predators because of its thick skin and ferocious defensive abilities. It is also listed as a genus of ‘Least Concern’ on the IUCN Red List. Shame really as it’s a horrible-looking thing with a coat that looks like a haircut of one of Steve Coogan’s Mancunian creations from the 1990’s. If it was to be wiped off the face of the earth, I doubt anyone would care.
Burnley have one that lives in their dressing room. Not a real one, you understand, but some company decided it would make a nice soft toy (for infants presumably rather than footballers) so you can buy one of these for grandchildren, nieces and nephews that you really don’t care for. So amidst the fresh fruit, grilled chicken and bottles of water that the players need to replenish reserves they have depleted over the last ninety minutes, sits a Honey Badger soft toy…
It’s there as a reminder: the Honey Badger will literally fight to the death. While it has a pulse that is still pulsing, it’s up for a bare-knuckle scrap: right now in the Car Park and then probably back inside for another couple of pints of Tennants Super…
A week later at Watford and well into the ninety-third minute, Jeff Hendricks is forced down the wing towards the corner flag by two giant Watford defenders. They dispossess him but he won’t accept he’s beaten and keeps at them, somehow nabs it back, turns and fights his way back infield to set up McNeil whose shot is parried away for Wood to finish, only to be wrongly disallowed. Against decisions like this, the instinct and mindset of the Honey Badger will be crucial in the fight for Premiership survival.
The final whistle blows. Led by Tom Heaton, the team troop over to applaud the supporters. It’s no choreographed lineup, and while all the players do it, it’s with various levels of deportment probably linked to various levels of being totally knackered and so has avoided descending into some Stalinist pageant. Now a Burnley tradition, it’s testament to the bond between club and its followers and as unique to the Premiership as this small, proud Lancashire town is to the richest football league in the world.