Jamie Jackson was at Turf Moor tonight and his report is in. Thanks for reading this MBM. Nighty night.
Vincent Kompany gives his verdict to Sky Sports. “We had five guys who started the first time for the club … we had chances … we knew it was going to be tough … we have to take the positives … you can’t feel good with a defeat but I’ve seen enough to show we’ve made progress since the last time we played them … this is the worst we’ll be this season, this team can only get stronger … it’s a mentality thing … it has to be the worst we will be, because we are focused on progress … I don’t know who in my squad will end up at the top level but I think some players will … results come because you do the work in the background and we have done that here … we were dangerous but not dangerous enough and against the best team in the world it is difficult … I felt we got something out of this game and something to build on.”
He also addresses, with statesmanlike grace, the booing of the knee at kick-off. “It’s not something new … it’s not something that has happened for the first time … so of course I can’t be happy with it, and I’m not … the colour of my skin should make it clear why … but in the end the amount of people who booed is a lot, lot less than it used to be, and there are a lot of people who clapped … so I believe in time and working together that these people are part of our family, no matter what, and we have to change their mentality … it’s a fraction of what it used to be … not good enough, but progress. Like this team.”
Pep talks to Sky. “Really good … the first games are so important to see our vibes … we found the goal in the first action to help us … we struggled but then we made long possessions and the game was over … we made more extra passes and everyone was really, really good … there is not any problem at all, Haaland scored two goals and I think he is happy … unfortunately De Bruyne is injured again … now we have lost him for a time … he has to recover and come back … this group of lads are exceptional … it was important to start well away and we did it.”
The supernaturally relaxed Erling Haaland speaks to Sky. “It’s good to start again … it’s been two months without … we did quite well for the first game of the season … it’s the first game of the marathon … I have to keep on working, keep on relaxing, and keep on not trying to think too much, not to focus on negative things … I don’t think, I just go there … everyone sees I am developing my game … it’s a pleasure working with Pep … I don’t know if there is anyone better to work with as a young player, because I am still young, don’t forget [cheeky sparkling smile] … I have to keep on developing and enjoy the chaos around me … I got a bit mad because Bernardo didn’t play me and Pep was mad at that … we have to try to chase things again.” He then swans off and gives Gary Neville a playful tap on the shoulder that has just enough force behind it to introduce an element of ambiguity. Neville laughs slightly nervously. All good fun.
Newly promoted Burnley will be happy enough with their performance tonight. They asked a few questions of Manchester City in the first half, but while their early verve augured well for the rest of the season, it wasn’t enough against the best team in the world, for whom Erling Haaland is a force of nature. Their quest to become the first team to win four English titles in a row starts nearly perfectly; the only worries are over the fitness of Kevin De Bruyne and Kyle Walker. Over to the rest of the Premier League, starting tomorrow. Good luck, everyone else!
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Man City | 1 | 3 | 3 |
| 2 | AFC Bournemouth | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 3 | Arsenal | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 4 | Aston Villa | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 5 | Brentford | 0 | 0 | 0 |
FULL TIME: Burnley 0-3 Manchester City
The Premier League is back … and Manchester City keep on keeping on!
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90 min +8: Benson goes down so the clock ticks on. He eventually gets back up.
90 min +6: Pity poor Craig Pawson, who had refereed the match invisibly, and clearly liked the idea of making it all the way through without the need to punish anyone. It was a challenge out of whack with the rest of the game … although it looked clumsy and desperate rather than aggressive. The match has been played in a good spirit.
90 min +5: Walker is replaced by McAtee. The Burnley fans give the referee the bird, but there’s no question about that red card.
RED CARD: Zaroury (Burnley)
90 min +4: In fact, VAR takes a look and ushers the referee over to the screen. Zaroury caught Walker on the shin, a potential leg-breaker. Yellow turns to red. Zaroury can have no argument.
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90 min +3: Walker tears off down the right and is cynically clipped by Zaroury. The first booking of the night. The referee didn’t want to show the yellow – he gave it some thought – but knew he had no choice.
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90 min +1: Brownhill comes on for Berge, while Foster replaces Redmond, who makes his Burnley debut.
90 min: Foster hustles down the left and wins a corner. Laporte bashes a header clear. There will be six added minutes.
89 min: City pass it around as the clock runs down. Plenty of added time doubtless coming up, though.
87 min: … and presumably the buffoon who has just entered the field of play to chase after Alvarez will get what’s coming to him, too. The first stage of his punishment: being wrestled to the ground. The second: being marched away with disapproving boos ringing in his ears.
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85 min: Burnley Football Club have released a statement to say that the oaf who threw a lighter at Rico Lewis’s head during the first half has been identified, ejected and banned.
84 min: Berge teases his way down the left and wins another Burnley corner. Nothing comes from it, but this is a decent spell for the hosts.
82 min: Corner for Burnley out on the right. Bruun Larsen, who has caused City a few problems, flashes a header over the bar. This hasn’t been Burnley’s night, nobody really expected it to be … but they’ll be happy with quite a few performances tonight, ones that augur well for the rest of the season. They won’t be playing the best team in the world every week.
80 min: … and it means Haaland won’t get his hat-trick tonight, because he’s replaced, along with Lewis and Ake. On come Palmer, Laporte and, making his City debut, Gvardiol.
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79 min: Haaland big-leggies his way down the middle. He really should be shooting from the edge of the D but feeds Alvarez to his left. Alvarez can’t get a shot away. Haaland is too generous for his own good sometimes. He could have had four tonight, easily, but keeps trying to set his mate up. What a guy, though.
77 min: It’s not all good news for City, though, because just before the third goal, Pep Guardiola was booked for telling it as he sees it. The first victim of the new War on Dissent is a high-profile one.
GOAL! Burnley 0-3 Manchester City (Rodri 75)
Al Dakhil skittles Haaland out on the left. The resulting free kick is curled in low by Foden. Ake makes a nuisance of himself on the edge of the six-yard box. Trafford can’t claim. The ball breaks back to Rodri, who slams into the left-hand side of the net from eight yards. Game over.
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73 min: Beyer goes down with cramp and is replaced by the exciting Benson.
71 min: City stroke the ball around patiently, as is so often their wont. Suddenly a bit of space for Foden down the left. He sweeps infield for Haaland, but can’t find his man free in the box.
69 min: A City corner. The offside flag goes up during a meleé. The ball’s played all the way back to Ederson, so the referee waves play on. The home fans aren’t happy City have been allowed to retain possession, but at least they’re getting more bang for their buck with the ball still in play, so it’s swings and roundabouts.
67 min: Rodri strides down the middle. The pitch opens up for him. Burnley open up for him. But he can’t decide whether to feed Haaland, just to his right, or shoot himself. Haaland eventually gets in his way, Rodri shoots, and the effort is blocked. Another very promising opportunity for goal number three goes begging.
65 min: More encouragement provided by the new man Bruun Larsen, whose buzzing presence panics City a little as the champions play their way out from the back. He strips Ake and would launch a counter had he not also needlessly shoved the City defender. A free kick gets Ake off the hook. Vincent Kompany not happy.
63 min: Cullen threads a clever pass down the right to send Bruun Larsen into space. The substitute winger wins a corner off Lewis. Nothing comes from the set piece, but that’s given the home crowd something to cheer about for the first time in a little while.
61 min: Burnley make a double change. Amdouni and Koleosho make way for Zaroury and Bruun Larsen.
60 min: Foden rolls a pass down the middle for Haaland, who brushes off O’Shea with an ease bordering on disdain. He powers towards the box and generously lays off to Alvarez on his right. Alvarez slashes wildly wide right of goal.
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59 min: City hog the ball imperiously. Burnley can’t get a sniff.
57 min: Alvarez should send Foden scampering clear but his pass down the middle is overhit and flies through to Trafford. City look in the mood for a third.
55 min: Rodri has a bang from the best part of 30 yards. Trafford tips the swerving, rising effort over the bar. Alvarez takes the resulting corner. Rodri meets it and guides a header towards the bottom left. Trafford is behind it all the way.
54 min: Burnley hold firm and clear the second corner. Appreciative applause as the hosts force City all the way back to Ederson.
53 min: … Foden attempts an overhead kick from the left-hand corner of the six-yard box. Blocked. Another corner coming up.
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52 min: Alvarez slips a pass down the inside-left channel. Haaland shoots from a tight angle. The fierce shot is deflected over for a corner. From which …
51 min: A nice end-to-end feel to this game. Foster probes down the Burnley left at speed but can’t find Amdouni in the middle; Silva nearly releases Haaland with a half-volleyed pass down the centre of the park.
50 min: You have to wonder whether Pep’s philosophical broadside was deliberately performative. A public show to categorically inform everyone that City won’t be easing up post-treble.
48 min: Incidentally, Guardiola, who had departed the scene at the end of the first half screaming at Haaland and yanking him by the arm mid-rollocking, emerged from the tunnel with his arm around Bernardo Silva. Carrot as well as stick.
46 min: Koleosho drives down the right and puts Ake on the back foot. His pass down the channel is intended for Foster but is easily picked off by Ederson.
Manchester City get the second half underway. No changes. “Can I be the first person to congratulate City on a historic fourth title in a row?” sighs Matt Dony.
Half-time reading.
HALF TIME: Burnley 0-2 Manchester City
Burnley have played pretty well. Only problem is, City are a slick machine and Erling Haaland is a phenomenon. As he trudges off, a livid Pep Guardiola gives him an earful. Of course he does.
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45 min +4: Ederson and Rodri faff about and nearly let Foster in. Foster goes over by the left-hand side of the D, but Burnley aren’t getting the free kick. Vincent Kompany isn’t happy.
45 min +3: “It’s weird that the Premier League is back while the World Cup is still on. It’s like if during a three-hour mega blockbuster film the cinema projected Coronation Street down in one corner of the screen.” Kári Tulinius there with a joke tailored specifically for tonight’s big event in Granadaland.
45 min +1: The first of five additional minutes. Foden chases another long ball. He’s clear. But he lets the ball clank between his legs and can’t get a shot away. Trafford claims. Foden thinks Al Dakhil has bundled him over, but the flag goes up for offside so it’s moot.
45 min: Ederson’s long pass nearly sets Foden free. O’Shea does just about enough to deal with the situation, though had his clearing header been any weaker, Foden was through.
43 min: Haaland’s double has taken a fair bit of wind out of the Turf Moor sail. In lieu of a Burnley goal in the next few minutes, a couple of half-time pints should get things moving again.
41 min: Haaland has so far touched the ball on nine occasions, for the record. Kevin De Bruyne has 12 to his name and he went off 15 minutes ago.
39 min: It’s not. Burnley clear, and Haaland must wait for his third goal of the half/match/season.
38 min: Actually, that’s not quite true. The corner does lead to something: a City counter. Alvarez busies himself down the right and is eventually skittled by Vitinho. Free kick and a chance already for Haaland to register his first hat-trick of the season, should Alvarez’s delivery be good enough.
37 min: Again Burnley respond well, Koleosho crossing low from the right, Foster shooting first time from the edge of the box. Akanji blocks, and nothing comes from the corner.
GOAL! Burnley 0-2 Manchester City (Haaland 36)
City, having taken the sting out of the game with a period of pretty passing, suddenly explode into life. Foden slips Walker in down the right. Walker cuts back for Alvarez, near the penalty spot. Alvarez rolls to Haaland, just to his right. Haaland meets the pass first time, lash-curling an unstoppable shot across Trafford and into the top left. He’s hardly had a touch. He’s already got two goals!
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35 min: Kovacic and Foden combine down the inside-right channel. Foden very nearly spins Vitinho with a cute backflick and turn, but can’t get a shot away and Trafford claims. That would have been one for the showreel had Foden finished it off.
33 min: City ping the ball around metronomically. “Boring, boring City,” chant the Burnley fans, satirically and in perfect time.
31 min: Those Burnley attacks have got the home crowd cooking. On the touchline, Pep Guardiola leaps about and gesticulates in the irritated fashion.
29 min: Foster works his way down the left and sends a fine curling shot across Ederson and wide right. This is a really impressive performance from Burnley, who have flat-out refused to crumble upon conceding the early goal.
28 min: Amdouni latches onto a loose Lewis pass and threatens to break clear down the middle. He can’t sort his feet out, and Rodri, nipping in from behind, toe-pokes away before he can get a shot on goal.
26 min: Back to the 20th minute, then, and Sky show footage of the prone Lewis being hit on the head with a cigarette lighter dispatched from the crowd. Not for the first time this evening: what’s wrong with people?
24 min: De Bruyne can’t continue. Not sure if that’s a recurrence of the hamstring injury that ruined his Champions League final or not. But he looks extremely disappointed as he trudges off, consoled by a couple of his team-mates, as though everyone knows only too well what’s happened. Kovacic comes on to make his City debut.
22 min: De Bruyne looks troubled, still standing but bent double in the centre circle. On comes the physio for a chat.
20 min: Koleosho has Lewis in a spot of bother, the City defender facing the wrong way near the corner flag. The young Burnley winger lets his equally young opponent off the hook by shoving him over impatiently. The obvious caveat of the goal apart, Burnley will be reasonably happy with the way they’ve started this game.
18 min: Amdouni drops a shoulder and nearly gets past Ake down the inside-left channel. He works enough space for a shot, which he slams low and hard from a tight angle, straight at Ederson.
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17 min: Beyer drags Haaland down 30 yards from the Burnley goal. De Bruyne wedges the free kick down the middle. Rodri attempts to steer a header into the bottom left. Trafford tips around the post and the flag goes up for offside, though Rodri looked to have timed his run well, and VAR might have had something to say had that gone in.
15 min: A lovely sweeping right-to-left move by Burnley. O’Shea finds Roberts down the flank. Roberts glides in and finds Foster, who slips Vitinho into space with a diagonal ball out left. Vitinho cuts back for Koleosho, who attempts to shape a sidefoot into the top right. Over the bar it flies. The crowd enjoyed the fluidity of that move. Almost City-esque.
13 min: Ake, quarterbacking from deep, tries to release Haaland down the middle. O’Shea intercepts and launches a counter. Foster attempts to trouble Walker down the left but City’s full-back gently takes control of the situation and clears. “Hey Burnley, and the rest of the PL,” begins Mary Waltz’s letter from America. “That tall blonde guy, when he gets in the box, make sure that at least one defender is marking him in touching distance. Two might be better. Don’t give him space. Unless you bet the over.”
11 min: Foden dribbles his way down the left and is checked crudely by Koleosho. Free kick, and a chance to swing one into the box. So of course City play it short and work it forward patiently, De Bruyne swinging one in from the left. Haaland extends a telescopic leg and hoicks over. He probably should have left it for Silva, stooping behind him and waiting to head home from six yards, but when you’re already a goal to the good with the season barely started, you can hardly blame the big man for attempting to double up quicksmart.
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9 min: Amdouni has started brightly, and forces Walker into the concession of a free kick out on the left. The resulting set piece is a waste of time, but Vincent Kompany will be happy with the way his newly promoted, newly constructed side have responded to that early setbeck.
7 min: Burnley respond well, Amdouni driving his way into the City box down the inside-right channel. He goes over, Akanji having briefly held the sleeve of his shirt. But there wasn’t much in it, and his crash to the floor was way too needy. The penalty shout is correctly turned down.
6 min: De Bruyne rakes a shot over the bar from 25 yards. Trafford had it covered, but that was close.
5 min: 184 seconds of the new season, that took. Meanwhile an email pings into my in-box. “What are the odds on Haaland suffering second-album syndrome?” asks Richard Hirst, if nothing else proving that comedy is all about timing.
GOAL! Burnley 0-1 Manchester City (Haaland 4)
De Bruyne rolls it short to Foden, who plays it back. De Bruyne hits long. Rodri, on the left-hand corner of the six-yard box, heads back across to Haaland, who sweeps into the bottom left from close range. Back in the old routine already!
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3 min: De Bruyne makes a run down the right and wins the first corner of the season off O’Shea. He’ll take it himself. And from that …
2 min: City quickly establish control, stroking it around the back smoothly and calmly. That didn’t take long.
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1 min: A knee was taken by all the players before kick-off, by the way. A light smattering of boos – what’s wrong with people? – but much more in the way of supportive applause.
Burnley get the 2023-24 Premier League season up and running! Turf Moor on a rolling boil of anticipation. A proper few-pints-in-on-Friday-night atmosphere.
The teams are out! Burnley’s new shirt is inspired by the 1994 home shirt, worn the year the Club were successfully promoted to the second tier of English football in a play-off victory against Stockport County is claret and blue, while City’s away shirt is inspired by the towering mills, buzzing warehouses and industry of the Manchester with the all-over tonal graphic print giving the shirt a retro feel, drawing inspiration from archival weave patterns from the city is white. We’ll be off in a couple of minutes.
Your regular reminder that a match between these two clubs once decided the identity of the champions of England. On a tense Monday night back in 1960, Burnley visited Maine Road to face City in the final game of the First Division season. Harry Potts’ team needed a victory to pip reigning champions Wolverhampton Wanderers to the prize, and deny Stan Cullis’s famous side a title hat-trick, and the chance of winning the double the following Saturday in the FA Cup final against Blackburn.
Brian Pilkington put Burnley in the lead after four minutes. Joe Hayes equalised for City soon after, only for 20-year-old reserve winger Trevor Meredith to restore the visitors’ advantage on the half hour, battering home a ball that had squirted out of a penalty-box meleé. City had their chances to level up again: Denis Law missed a golden chance midway through the second half, while Alan Oakes shot straight at Clarets keeper Adam Blacklaw when one on one right at the very end. But that was that.
Burnley were the champions! City finished 16th that season. Wolves beat Blackburn in the cup final the following weekend and on their victory lap were pelted with scrunched-up programmes and apple cores by neutrals bored rigid after their routine 3-0 win over ten men. Cathy’s Clown began a seven-week run at number one in the Hit Parade, while on BBC Television, Anthony Aloysius Hancock, the lad himself, received a steady stream of hate mail and then an unwelcome surprise upon asking the police to investigate: he’d been writing them to himself in his sleep.
I’ve gone off piste here. To be fair, it’s easy to lose concentration: at 90 minutes, Sky are spreading their pre-match package mighty thin.
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City manager Pep Guardiola takes his turn. “Not even last season we thought to win the treble … we climbed the highest mountain but we area again at the bottom and there are a lot of stones … last season is nice, our memories, but we have to start again.”
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Burnley boss Vincent Kompany talks to Sky Sports. “We’ll take it one step at a time … I hope [his players] can get something out of this game, not just a result but a little bit of momentum, get a tackle in, a dribble, a shot, and build something hopefully special.”
Five players make their Burnley debut tonight. Norway midfielder Sander Berge, Switzerland striker Zeki Amdouni, young Italian winger Luca Koleosho, Republic of Ireland defender Dara O’Shea and, formerly of City, goalkeeper James Trafford. Two other new signings in Nathan Redmond and Jacob Bruun Larsen are on the bench.
Manchester City’s starting XI are all familiar faces from last season. They do have two new names on the subs list, though, in Croatia defender Josko Gvardiol and his international team-mate Mateo Kovacic.
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The teams
Burnley: Trafford, Roberts, O’Shea, Al Dakhil, Beyer, Koleosho, Berge, Cullen, Vitinho, Amdouni, Foster.
Subs: Redmond, Bruun Larsen, Cork, Gudmundsson, Brownhill, Benson, Ekdal, Zaroury, Muric.
Manchester City: Ederson, Walker, Akanji, Ake, Lewis, De Bruyne, Rodri, Bernardo Silva, Alvarez, Foden, Haaland.
Subs: Phillips, Kovacic, Grealish, Laporte, Ortega, Gomez, Gvardiol, Palmer, McAtee.
Referee: Craig Pawson (South Yorkshire).
Preamble
The Premier League is back, baby! According to the Sky Sports marketing bumf, it’s the Greatest Show On Earth™, which is fair enough, we’re not here to argue, though perhaps the game picked to launch this spectacular could more accurately be described as the Most Wondrous Nailed-On Non-Event In The Galaxy®. Manchester City have won their last 11 matches against Burnley in league and cup to an aggregate tune of 40-1. Roll up, roll up to watch the Clarets roll over.
You wouldn’t bet too much coin on tonight’s hosts snapping that run tonight against their all-conquering treble-winning guests. Vincent Kompany’s new-look team notched up 101 points en route to the Championship title last season, but City humbled them 6-0 in the FA Cup, and Nathan Tella has gone back to parent club Southampton. City meanwhile … well, we don’t need to belabour the point. Suffice to say Burnley’s return to the big time begins with what is effectively a chance to acclimatise and a free hit against opponents they hope to catch cold. Kick off at Turf Moor is at 8pm BST. It’s on!
