Burnley are coming to town. You can’t say much else.
It’s come round again quickly enough. It only seems five minutes since we were playing Burnley, and here it is again. The last home game of the season’s raced round a bit sharpish as well. It’s your age.
Burnley again it is, and the chance to get a quickfire double over a team of strugglers. For them the match is a big one in an attempt to avoid relegation, for us it’s all about the chance of finishing in the top half. And on that subject, have you ever noticed how the media talk about the battle for Europe, or to finish in the top half, but hardly ever the top eight, or twelve? This, I’m sure, has nothing to do with being able to put money on getting into Europe and finishing in the top half, but not the top twelve. Perish the thought.
Anyway, it’s the last home match and while it should be on a Saturday, or at least part of Sky’s Super Soaraway Last Day Extravaganza, we have to make do with Thursday at eight. Burnley will probably be the same as the team we battered in the Lancashire badlands the other week, we’ve got Ezri Konsa out for the rest of the season and probably the start of the next one, with Emi Martinez picking up an injury in training. One day these things will happen to other clubs. Due to its importance they’ll probably bring more than they would usually, all of them turning up to gaze in wonder at such technological miracles as electric street lamps and tarmacadamed roads.
Now, the outcome. it should be the sort of result that makes the away match look close, but be honest; wouldn’t a small, infinitesimally tiny, part of you not be all that upset if we didn’t win, and Leeds/Everton went down as a result? Go on, admit it.