Aug 24th: An evening with the directors

[ClaretTony]

Today's look at games played on 24th August starts with a goalless draw and ends in probably one of the most embarrassing League Cup exits experienced by the Clarets.

That 0-0 draw came on the opening day of the season in 1957 at Portsmouth. Manager Alan Brown had gone to Sunderland and Billy Dougall had been given the job. It was a good start for the new man, Fratton Park was no easy place to go.

On 2nd May 1960, Burnley Football Club became champions of England for a second time when we won at Maine Road. By chance, our next away game was at exactly the same place. We'd beaten Arsenal at home in the first game of this season but this time there was to be no victory at Manchester City's old ground although Jimmy Robson did give us an early lead. Winger Colin Barlow equalised for them right on half time before Joe Hayes netted to win it for City. So, both games ended 2-1 with us winning one each. I wouldn't swap them.

A year after winning the title, Ipswich had finished 17th and kicked off the 1963/64 season which would see them relegated. It wasn't the best of places to send us on the opening day of the season, Portman Road is not a ground where we have succeeded very often. By half time we were 2-0 down with Ray Crawford getting both and despite Brian Miller pulling one back we went on to lose 3-1 with inside forward Doug Moran getting on the scoresheet for the home side.

It was a good start to the 1965/66 season. We'd drawn the first game at Chelsea and on the Tuesday night beat Blackpool 3-1 at home. Blackpool's goal came late in the day but we'd gone 3-0 up just past the half hour. Arthur Bellamy, who had scored at Chelsea, opened the scoring and then followed goals from, and you won't need to guesses to name them, Andy Lochhead and Willie Irvine.

Wins in the previous two games sent us to West Brom full of confidence in 1968, to a ground where we'd conceded eight in the previous season. It was still 0-0 with two minutes to go to half time but we went in at the interval 2-0 down and it was all over when West Brom got a third eight minutes from time or was it? Yes, is the answer but only just as first Frank Casper and then Lochhead pulled goals back in the final three minutes. Although he would score two League Cup goals against Grimsby, Lochhead's goal was his 101st and final league goal for Burnley.

Did I say trips to Ipswich were not to be encouraged? We were there again in 1974 on the Saturday after we'd come from three behind to draw at Chelsea. We were beaten here 2-0 but there was more significance than the result. We were about to lose Martin Dobson to Everton, a transfer that caused more anger among Burnley fans than any since the sale of Jimmy McIlroy.

This day in 1977 was my big day. A good friend of mine, who was training as an accountant back then, had done some work during the summer for a company owned by a bloke called Charlie Dean who told him he was a director of Fulham and that he'd send him a couple of tickets when they played at Burnley. Lo and behold it was the first home game and the tickets duly arrived and for the directors box no less.

It was unheard of then for mere mortals to be allowed into the inner sanctum of Bob Lord's world and my word it was an eye opener. The club were in financial trouble at the time but you would never have believed it and you could never have seen so many hangers on eating and drinking as much as they could free of charge. It was an experience but I was appalled by some of them and, in truth, was happy to get back to my spot on the Longside for the next game although with Burnley having won we did get a visit from the chairman in our room after the game. We were told by a couple of regular hangers on that you didn't see him for dust when we lost but there he was with that beaming grin on his face.

Yes, we won. Ray Hankin and Paul Bradshaw gave us a two goal lead with Fulham pulling one back a couple of minutes before half time. Peter Noble completed the 3-1 win from the penalty spot just before the hour. I can confirm that I've never watched a game from the directors box since.

We need to jump twenty years now to the Adrian Heath era at Turf Moor and this was a good start to the season. We'd already won one league game and one in the League Cup. This was a second win in the league with a 2-1 win against Walsall. David Eyres gave us the lead but Kevin Wilson equalised just before half time. Kurt Nogan it was who clinched the win with a goal just three minutes into the second half. Just under twenty minutes from the end I saw something that I think was for the first time when Walsall boss, former Burnley player Chris Nichol, made a triple substitution. One of the players coming on was a young striker called Michael Ricketts. I wonder what happened to him.

It's a mixture of league and League Cup games now starting with the second leg of the tie against Manchester City in 1999. I don't think too many Burnley fans were confident given we'd lost the first leg 5-0 at Maine Road. That lack of confidence was justified; City won this one 1-0 with a goal from Terry Cooke. Stephen Grant came on as a substitute for Graham Branch in the second half. He'd done similar in the first leg, coming on for Glen Little. They proved to be the only two appearances for the new signing from Stockport. He soon left to go and work in the family business in Ireland.

It as league action in 2002 and things weren't improving other than the fact we only conceded one goal, that scored by Iffy Onuora during the first half. It hadn't been a good start to the season, it was now played three, lost three.

A couple of away wins now in the League Cup. We beat Bury 3-2 in 2004 although we didn't make a good start. Dwayne Mattis gave Bury the lead only for him to score again at the wrong end and level the scores. Dave Challinor made it 2-1 to the home side within a minute but then we had Robbie Blake and he scored twice, the first of them from the penalty spot, to give us a 3-2 win. Bury had a young striker playing who had been getting a lot of attention. He didn't do much but did smile a lot; his name was David Nugent.

It was a first, and to date only, competitive game against Morecambe in 2010. We were behind here too with a goal from former Evertonian Phil Jevons. On a night when youngsters Michael King and Wes Fletcher both got debuts as substitutes, we went on to win 3-1. Chris Eagles equalised before Steven Thompson equalised from the penalty spot. Kevin McDonald made it 3-1 close to the end.

Leonardo Ulloa and Andrew Crofts both scored against us for Brighton at the Amex in 2013 but the talking point in this game was the ludicrous red card shown to Tom Heaton early in the second half. He'd been yellow carded in the first half, some say it might have been a red, but the second yellow was not even an offence and referee Darren Sheldrake got it very badly wrong. It was our first defeat of the season in the fourth game on a pretty bad day weather wise. So bad was the rain in the south east that Charlton's home game had to be postponed.

Finally, the Morecambe tie remains the only competitive game between the two clubs and four years ago it was the same when we travelled to Accrington in the League Cup. There were three incidents, potentially three, for which referee Tony Harrington should have shown a red card. One by former Burnley player Shay McCartan on Aiden O'Neill was an absolute disgrace.

Even so, we should not have been losing that game but did when Matthew Pearson scored the only goal in the 120th minute. Incredible, we'd beaten Liverpool on the previous Saturday but Sean Dyche had made ten changes with only Sam Vokes starting both games.

Jon Flanagan made his debut; it wasn't good while O'Neill made his one and only start in the first team. Fredrik Ulvestad and Lukas Jutkiewicz never played for us again and Tendayi Darikwa was only ever used in cup games from then until he left the club in the following summer.