SEAN Dyche admitted today’s win over Brighton brought ‘joy and relief’ to him and his side.

The Clarets climbed out of the Premier League’s bottom three after ending an eight-game winless run.

James Tarkowski scored what proved to be the winner in the 40th minute, diverting Jack Cork’s initial shot past Brighton goalkeeper Mat Ryan.

And then the England international contributed to a resilient defensive performance to protect the result and clean sheet as the Seagulls applied late pressure with a succession of corners.

“There’s a mixture of joy at the win, that we all love, and a bit of relief because we’ve been on a tough run,” said the Burnley boss.

“Everyone feels it. The crowd felt it right at the end when they were putting corners in and spinning it in the box from everywhere – that bit of nervousness. But you get that one closed off like we did and we’ll see what comes next.

“It’s been a tough early period of the season. We’re kind of getting back to where I think we should be performance wise but then you’ve got to turn performances into results.

“I think we’ve actually played better than we did today, but the basics were done very well. The quality of the shape, the importance of the details, the resilience of the side shown many, many times, and those features are coming back into the side.

“I’ve always said that gives you a base to work from. We still know we can play better with the ball, we still know technically we can find better moments. We had four or five during the game and two or three particularly in the second half that were clear breakaway situations on the counter when we should do better, and then we kill the game off.”

Dyche added: “We’ve ground one out today. Chris’s side have done terrific this season and they’re a similar version of ourselves, they keep it tight, they don’t create loads and loads of chances, they’ve still got some good players and they keep it defensively tight.

“We didn’t think there was going to be loads in the game so you’ve got to get on the right side of the margins.

“I talked about it last season and this season, and today we did that.”

But the Burnley boss was frustrated that his side have now gone 58 games without a penalty, with appeals for a spot kick for a foul on Phil Bardsley ignored when he was caught in the head when Yves Bissouma attempted an overhead kick in the penalty area.

“We still can’t get the elusive penalty. I don’t know what incident is going to have to occur but when it does I hope it’s something that really counts for us and not when we’re in front or behind when it doesn’t count. It’s 58 I think now and there were two shouts today,” he said.

“Bruno gets done on the run by Robbie Brady and body checks him in the box. The reason I know that is because I was a defender, I know when you’ve been done and I can tell by his body language, he’s panicked and thought ‘I’ve got to nudge him’. He more than nudges him, he puts him off the flight of the ball. That one’s a maybe, but you see them given.

“And then the one on Bardo… he’s got kicked in the head more or less – no malice, by the way, but anywhere (else) on the pitch that’s dangerous play, so I don’t see how it’s not in the box. For me that has to be a penalty. But it didn’t affect the game in a negative manner so I’m pleased with that. But we’ve got to start getting a fair shout.

“I think Brighton have had four or five in the league, Bournemouth six, but we haven’t had one in 58 so I’m still searching for that.”