10:01am Monday 15th March 2010
By Suzanne Geldard
MANAGER Brian Laws has vowed not to throw in the towel, despite Burnley’s poor run extending to just one win in 19 Premier League games.
The Clarets missed the chance to climb out of the relegation zone and create a three-point gap over Wolves after suffering their fourth home defeat of the season.
Instead, the Midlands side are now benefiting from breathing space, and a game in hand, following a 2-1 win at Turf Moor.
“We feel a little bit hard done by and it’s knocked the stuffing out of us.
"But we’ve got to move on again,” said Laws, for whom the task of engineering a first away win, at Wigan on Saturday, has intensified.
“It’s disappointing and it’s a huge knock that we’ve got to take, but we’ve got eight games to go.
“There are still a lot of games to be played and a lot of points to play for.
“That’s a body blow for us but we can’t let it affect us and we certainly can’t allow it to destroy our last eight games.
“There’s still an awful lot of games to be played and it only takes one win and we’re back in it.
“Certainly nobody at this football club is going to be disillusioned or disappointed. We’re going to move on and keep fighting away until it’s mathematically impossible.
“While there’s a little bit of a gap we’ve got to try to improve our away performance. If we get an away win under our belt all of a sudden the disappointment of our home defeat is melted away.”
Laws came in for vehement criticism for withdrawing Chris Eagles in a double substitution 10 minutes into the second half. But the Burnley boss felt his decision was vindicated, not least when Eagles’ replacement, Steven Thompson, pulled a goal back with his first Premier League strike.
Robbie Blake, who came on for Andre Bikey, had earlier been denied by the post.
“I’m a little bit disappointed with the fact the crowd were disappointed with that, but I hope that on reflection they might look at it more as a positive than a negative,” said Laws, who was without Kevin McDonald because of a back problem and on-loan Jack Cork because of a calf injury.
“We tried to put some legs in the middle of the midfield because I thought that’s where we were lacking a little bit, that’s why I put Wade Elliott in there. I was being positive with Blakey and I thought he was exceptionally good when he came on.
“Those judgement calls were perfect. We had more attempts at goal in that last 30 minutes than we had all game.
“They’re the positives. A striker goes on and scores a goal, what more could you ask?”
But Laws felt luck had deserted them for a Wolves side who had previously bemoaned a lack of it.
“Mick McCarthy had been talking about not having any luck but they certainly got it (on Saturday).
“It was a poor mistake by ourselves which gave them the first goal.
"It was unfortunate but we had to regroup and push it to one side and get on with the game.
“We had a few chances in the first half to get back into it, we hit the crossbar, but didn’t quite hit the back of the net.
“The key is obviously not to concede so early in the second half, but we did with a deflection.
“It didn’t seem to be our day. As far as luck’s concerned it certainly deserted us.
“I didn’t think we deserved that. But obviously with a two-goal lead they’ve got something to hang onto.
“Mick McCarthy may admit they’re hanging on at the death.
"That just shows commitment is there, we just need a little bit of luck on our side.”
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