That Burnley exited the FA Cup with a rather limp performance was not the main issue at Turf Moor on Saturday.

It was the more the fact that no-one seemed to really care.

Just a shade over 8,000 fans watched this fourth round tie, nearly 800 of them having admirably made the trip up from Norwich.

The empty stands told their own story and so did the reactions post-match.

There was no post-mortem as you would find after a Premier League defeat, just, by and large, a shrug of the shoulders and an acknowledgement by all that this meeting on a cold January afternoon, sandwiched between clashes with Manchester United and Arsenal, was a mere distraction from the bigger picture.

That is of course Premier League survival, meaning none of the parties involved can be blamed for their apathy towards the FA Cup. Any finger pointing about the status of the world’s most iconic competition needs to be reserved for those in power.

That Sean Dyche’s five changes to his line-up from the Old Trafford triumph was deemed as surprisingly few shows you just what an inconvenience this is becoming for most clubs.

Of course, both sides wanted to win, and on paper the Clarets were expected to with Daniel Farke making seven alterations, but more than anything there was a sense of relief that we didn’t have to do it all again at Carrow Road – a game which would have bizarrely eaten in to this year’s debut of a winter break.

With all that in mind, Burnley’s performance matched the occasion in truth.

After the highs of a first Old Trafford win since 1962 this was flat from the off, Norwich attacking at will.

How the first half ended goalless is anyone’s guess. The hosts had chance after chance, Teemu Pukki only introduced for the closing stages off the bench with his understudy Josip Drmic wasteful when trying to profit on some charitable Clarets defending, the first chance coming and going less than 10 seconds into the game.

James Tarkowski was the standout player on the pitch, blocking one effort from Sam Byram on the line, but Kevin Long struggled badly on a rare start alongside him.

For all the threat the Canaries carried, the hosts could also have taken an early lead but Jay Rodriguez was denied by Ralf Fahrmann after good work from Chris Wood.

Joe Hart, on cup duty for the third time this season, was needed to keep out efforts from Onel Hernandez and Lukas Rupp with a last-ditch Tarkowski challenge stopping Marco Vrancic having a clear sight of goal.

Everywhere in the first half, Tarkowski then popped up at the other end and headed an Ashley Westwood corner against the top of the crossbar.

Openings then came and went at either end before the break, Drmic again unable to capitalise on some lax defending, before the game changed in four second-half minutes.

Former Blackburn defender Grant Hanley, in a moment he surely savoured, opened the scoring eight minutes after the interval, rising far too easily above Long to head home in front of the delighted travelling support.

It was two on 57 minutes. Rupp was played onside by Erik Pieters and ghosted in behind before trying to lift the ball over Hart who, at full stretch, could only direct the ball into the path of the grateful Drmic who could not miss an open goal.

Jeff Hendrick and Matej Vydra were introduced but largely flattered to deceive before Pieters fired home a goal out of nothing from 20 yards having had a pretty wretched afternoon at left back.

Would that spark a mad rush for a replay? Think again.

Dwight McNeil did of course provide some late spark when brought on for the final 10 minutes but the Clarets bid farewell to this season’s FA Cup with the minimum of fuss.

If the Premier League is the ultimate focus then Dyche will hope that this forgettable day at the office has not halted his side’s momentum too much as they look to navigate a path to guaranteeing another season in the top flight.

Post-match talk quickly turned to Arsenal and getting a long-awaited win over the Gunners.

Now that is something people care about.