Steve Bruce had trawled through his memory banks to think of a worse performance during his reign at Hull City. There was none, he concluded, in the Premier League. Often avuncular, Bruce cut an unforgiving figure as he excoriated his players. “I can’t dress it up any other way,” he said. “I can’t defend them.” Sternly, he vowed there would be no repeat. “Make no mistake. It won’t happen again.”
Yet perhaps his most pertinent comment could have seemed a statement of the blindingly obvious. “We’re Hull City, let’s not forget that,” the manager said. “We’re kidding ourselves if we think we’re better than we are.” For 90 minutes, Hull had an identity crisis. They had prospered as underdogs at the Emirates Stadium and Anfield but Burnley, the ultimate outsiders, usurped them to claim that mantle. “There was an expectation for us to come here and turn them over,” Bruce said. “But we were so lacklustre and lifeless it was scary.”
He has overseen a glamorous upgrade at the KC Stadium. It prompted the suggestion that defeat was all the more galling because, on paper, he had the best group of players he had assembled during his 16 years in management. His reply was succinct. “Names on paper mean absolutely jack shit when you play like that,” he said. “You’ve got to have names that produce a performance.”
Bruce played with many of the biggest names of his generation in a Manchester United side who possessed battling qualities and technical skills in equal measure. Two decades on, he could call on Abel Hernández and Gastón Ramírez, both members of Uruguay’s World Cup squad, among his attacking options. His Burnley counterpart, Sean Dyche, fielded Danny Ings and Ashley Barnes, formerly of Dorchester Town and Salisbury City respectively. Supposedly lesser figures had the bigger impact.
“I have played in nearly every league possible, right from the bottom,” said Barnes, whose maiden Premier League goal clinched Burnley’s first win at this level since 2010. “So it’s a dream come true to play in the Premier League and to get off the mark. It’s the first of many, hopefully.”
Part of the charm of the Burnley squad lies in tales of such unlikely rises. Four of their starting 11 had graduated from the non-league scene and a fifth, the left-back Stephen Ward, from the League of Ireland. If the thought was that Hull, who secured a surprise promotion to the Premier League and confounded expectations by staying up and strengthening, were the role models for Burnley, the opposite scenario transpired. “They’re fighting desperately hard to stay in the division but we should know because we were like them 12 months ago,” Bruce said. “The sad indictment was that they had a greater desire to win the game.”
And victories have been in short supply for Hull. Five often entertaining and admirable draws have kept them out of trouble this season but they have triumphed only twice, against Queens Park Rangers and Crystal Palace. Their next three opponents all finished in the top seven last season. “We’ll be at the bottom of the table playing like that,” Bruce warned.
Burnley remain at the foot of the table. They occupy the position most expect them to but they were unconcerned when others suggested they might not win all season. Predictions they will beat a swift return to the Championship serve only to galvanise them. “We got written off last year at the start of the season, the middle of the season when we were up there and even at the end, people thought we were going to drop away,” said the centre-back and captain Jason Shackell, as defiant off the pitch as he had proved on it. “Keep writing us off and we’ll keep proving you wrong.”
Dyche has married an upbeat demeanour with an awareness of the economic realities. If anything, however, he understated the scale of their challenge. “There are two divisions, if not three, within the Premier League,” he said. “We know where ours is. Our market is different to that.” Financially, Burnley are in a league of their own – or the Championship – but teamwork, team spirit and organisation cannot be measured on the balance sheet. They have often been hallmarks of Hull. Not on Saturday, though.
Man of the match Danny Ings (Burnley)
