The Burnley View: Clarets safe?

Hot favourites for relegation in pre-season, Burnley are so far proving the experts wrong with sensational home form and a strong team spirit. To learn more about their odds-defying achievements, The Football Lab spoke to supporter Robbie Coppack. You can follow him on Twitter @Robbiecoppack.

In the summer you were worried about the slow transfer business, and whether the club had learnt it’s lessons from last season. You must be delighted to be 10 points clear of the drop zone at this stage?

I would go as far to say that we are as good as safe now, obviously still need a couple more wins to guarantee that. But it would take a horrendous nose dive in form if we were to be dragged into mix now. Don’t think many of us expected to be a point outside the top 10 after the half way point in the season. The players and coaching staff have been excellent, I think being a bit more flexible in our formation has helped us in a big way.

Sean Dyche has done a superb job since taking over in October 2012. In his first six months in charge, was there any evidence that this kind of progress could be possible?

Not really, to be honest some of us including myself were far from happy with him in his early months with the club. We were dragged into a relegation battle in the Championship. Football was awful, no fight and we had very little to shout about.

At Turf Moor, Burnley look a formidable outfit capable of taking on anyone, but away from home, they often look scared. For all the good work Dyche and the players have done, do they deserve some criticism for the failings on the road?

Our away form is a strange one, up to around Christmas we didn’t look like getting anything out of them. Since the defeat at West Ham, our displays on the road have been far more encouraging. To only lose 2-1 at Spurs and Man City and then narrowly lose at Arsenal which I don’t want to go into too much detail about as I’ll begin to breakdown in tears. But our latest away performance at Watford was excellent, to be reduced to 10 men after 5 minutes and be 2-0 at HT and argue that we were unlucky not to grab a point in the end is again very encouraging.

Three of your 12 defeats this season have come without Steven Defour, eight of the nine others came against teams in the top half. How important a player is he?

Massive player for us, he’s probably our only player that has real technical ability. His goal against Bristol City in the last round of the FA Cup was probably the best goal I’ve been from an individual point of view. His reading of the game and the way he presses off the ball is excellent and he can pick a pass too. Do worry we will lose him in the summer, as a move to China is being speculated.

Key man Dean Marney picked up a long-term injury recently. Are you confident you have the players in midfield to cope without him?

Dean Marney is another big player for us and to lose him to another ACL injury is devastating, just like the last Premier League campaign. Ultimately it cost us that year, as we were forced to play Scott Arfield in CM, which isn’t his best role with us. However this time around, we do have the bodies to cope. Ashley Westwood has arrived from Aston Villa, the return of Joey Barton is another bonus too.

However, we have also lost Steven Defour to a hamstring injury in the Leicester game last week, Jeff Hendrick misses the next three games due to suspension which again is a blow. But after these short term setbacks, we will cope quite well I imagine.

Tom Heaton has had some good games this season – particularly the wonder-show at Old Trafford. Player of the season so far?

I think so, his double save in the dying minutes against Southampton at Turf Moor always sticks in my mind, saved us three valuable points there and will continue to do so between now and May. You could probably argue our two centre backs, Michael Keane and Ben Mee are in with a shout. Both very consistent and both could play for England. However, I think majority of our fan bases wouldn’t disagree if Tom Heaton was awarded our Player of the Year.

Do Burnley play best with a 4-4-2 when Andre Gray partners Sam Vokes, or when the latter starts up top on his own in a 4-5-1?

Difficult to say which suits us better, we do appear more fluid in the 4-5-1 and we keep the ball much better as you could imagine. But in the 4-4-2 shape we seem more difficult to beat. For example, we played 4-4-2 away at Old Trafford and at the Emirates and we were excellent in both games. So its hard to really suggest which is better. It’s nice to have a bit of flexibility about us now.

You predicted relegation for Burnley in pre-season – you must be more optimistic about survival now?

As I said above, we are as good as safe now. I don’t imagine us going on a six or seven losing run to throw us into the mix now.