Burnley FC
Formed: 1882
Home: Turf Moor
Capacity: 22,068
Nickname: The Clarets
Burnley were founder members of the Football association and have won the FA cup, and been league champions four times, the last time being back in season 1961/62. The club were eventually relegated from the top tier in 1970/71 and since then they have mainly struggled in the lower reaches of the Football League.
Burnley were in Championship when it was formed in 2004/05 and most season’s started extremely well and the club were usually in a play off position early on. Just after Christmas their results would always start to tail off and they would end the season in mid table.
Current manager Owen Coyle who arrived at the club late in 2007 changed that mindset and they reached the play offs last season after maintaining their top six off position for most of the season. Few punters would have bet on Burnley making the Premiership, but after beating Sheffield United 1-0 in the play offs the Clarets were actually there and few would begrudge them their chance to mix it with the big boys.
Burnley are hot favourites to go straight back down into the Championships, but small Northern clubs-Blackburn, Bolton and Wigan- have been promoted and done well in the Premier League and it’s possible Burnley may well be another. Betting on Burnley to be relegated at odds on would seem to be the obvious thing to do if you are having a bet on Burnley, but the bookmakers got it wrong with Hull and Stoke last season and might have done here again with Burnley.
There are some worries however about betting on Burnley avoiding the drop. They have a really small squad and that could be a huge disadvantage if they pick up a few injuries and suspensions to senior players. They have made some signings and some decent ones too-Steve Fletcher from Hibernian is a very good player and has the potential to develop into a top class striker-but will still need to add more players of the right quality to survive a season in the Premier League.
Burnley showed enough I good cup runs last season that they can compete in one-off match with Premiership teams. A fourth bottom finish would probably be see as a success and we’re going to stick our neck out here a bit and say they won’t go down.
It could pay to bet on Burnley in home matches against bottom half of the table teams. A bet on Burnley to stay up could also be worth a small investment.