CCC, Play Off's 2009

[devilsadvocate]

The Clarets are on the march.

Look out Sheff U!

[blues2002]

Well done Clarets.

Disappointing end for the Royals. No home wins since January

[Bully]

whens the play off between burnley and sheff? like to watch it as that game tends to be great and better then alot of premier league games.

[RoosterMarty]

Brilliant win for Burnley.

I think Sheffield United will start favourites but Burnley can definitely win the game. Should be a cracker.

[The Jack]

Congratulations Burnley (my 2nd favourite team now, I think!) and JTC! Good luck at Wembley!

[Dirko]

Can remember the Derby game at Wembley all those years ago now...Cracking night of football watching !!

Good luck to you JTC & the Clarets !!

ALL ABOARD THE CLARET TRAIN !!

[Dogwatcher]

No sign of JTC yet????

[Dirko]

No sign of JTC yet????

Nor Mrs JTC !

Giddyup big fella !!

[The Jack]

Can remember the Derby game at Wembley all those years ago now...Cracking night of football watching !!

Good luck to you JTC & the Clarets !!

ALL ABOARD THE CLARET TRAIN !!

TOOT TOOT!!!!

[devilsadvocate]

OK Lads, for those that didn't manage to catch the game, here are the goals. Patersons is one of the best goals you'll ever, ever see. Absolute class. What a time to pull it out too. My favourite part though is the reaction of the Claret faithful. Can anyone spot JTC?

Patersons peach of a strike:

http://en.soccerclips.net/videos/reading-0-1-burnley-paterson

Thompsons lob:

http://en.soccerclips.net/videos/reading-0-2-burnley-thompson

Talk us through them JTC. No doubt 2 of the greatest moments of your football following life.

Hopefully there's another on May 25

[johntheclaret]

****,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

What happened there then

Hotel bar was rocking last night or this morning

Still can't believe it. The clarets are going to wembley

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeessssssssssssssssss bloody hell

Best night of my life. I was so p1ssed even my p1ssed bits were p1ssed. Dreading the bar bill this am

On my phone now so I'll tell you all about it when / if I get back. I like Reading so much I might live here LOL

[johntheclaret]

Thanks for the good wishes fellas

Gonna take a big sign to wembley

"Safooy official clarets fan club"

[johntheclaret]

Well done Clarets.

Disappointing end for the Royals. No home wins since January

Unlucky blues2002

1st half reading played like they did at turf moor and so did Burnley

Great gesture by the reading fans that stayed on after the end. Applauded the claret fans and the few that were left in the hotel after were great too. Came over and joined us for a drink or three.

Except for one knobhead " this is our bar" LOL

[whufc]

was up at 3.00am to start cooking a massive bacon and eggs, tomato championgons breakfast for me and my mate Posty who is a massive Burnley fan, he was born and bred there until he moved to Australia.

What a game, and 2 of the finest goals. My mate is now like a little kid, trying to work out the plans for what we will do playoff final morning. Go to town or he may come around my place and watch again.

For Posty and JTC sake come on you CLARETS.

[Pidge]

That first goal is one of the best goals i have seen in a while... good work Burnley!!!

Hope they get promoted.

[johntheclaret]

was up at 3.00am to start cooking a massive bacon and eggs, tomato championgons breakfast for me and my mate Posty who is a massive Burnley fan, he was born and bred there until he moved to Australia.

What a game, and 2 of the finest goals. My mate is now like a little kid, trying to work out the plans for what we will do playoff final morning. Go to town or he may come around my place and watch again.

For Posty and JTC sake come on you CLARETS.

Buy him a return ticket to london whufc.

[johntheclaret]

Reading manager Steve Coppell resigned last night.

To be honest, the guy looked really really gutted.

Anyway, on to the happy news,

que sera sera
whatever will be will be
were going to wemberrrrley
que sera sera


I am soooooooooooooooooooo f**king happy.

OK Burnley weren't great, under the cosh for the 1st half and pressed back just like the game on Saturday. Coyle said in the after match interview that he told the boys to push out in the 2nd half and stop being so defensive. And that's just what they did. Pattos goal.......Sensational. hit it so sweet, but a lot of credit must be given to Wade Elliot, who drew both reading defenders wide with his overlap and created the space for Patto to run into. Patto's dummy pass to Elliot did the rest and by the time they realised what was happening it was too late.

The other noticeable thing about the defending was the time it took the Reading centreback to get across to Patto. I guess that was the main difference between the two sides last night. Caldwell and Carlisle in both games were magnificent. they blocked, harried and put the foot in everytime, and backed each other up with a "they shall not pass" determination. The reading centreback didn't make much of an effort to get back to Patto, when he found himself out of position. Just a bit of a jog back really.

then there was Thommos goal. At Turf Moor we didn't have any wingers. Elliot was injured and Eagles was carrying a knock from early on so we were forced into playing a long ball to a lone Patto against the two massive buks of Bikey and Duberry, which clearly wasn't going to work. We brought Thommo on late to help shore up the front line. But at Reading Thommo was on from the start and his height and strength made a difference. It was a long ball the Thommo firstly won and then lobbed that got the goal.

I have seen the Clarets play way better many times this year, than they did in both games, but when you look at the scoreline and the aggregate score, it reads 3 - 0. Plain and simple as that 3 bloody 0.

[johntheclaret]

I know I am going over the top, but I thought I would share my day / night with you.

We drove down (5 hours) and stayed in the Madejski stadium hotel. Nice enough place attached to the staduim so we didn't have far to walk to the seats.
We went down to the bar for a drink. No problems.
Then a few of the lads turned up, but couldn't get in as they were "away fans" and the hotel doesn't allow away fans in because they cause trouble.
I went out to see if I could get them in only to be told I couldn't go in either. "But I am a guest here". "Sorry sir but you are an away fan so you can't go in". " But i have a room here, we are staying in the hotel, you buffoon" (I didn't actually call him a buffoon, cos he was a bouncer and 3 times bigger then me, but you get the drift"
Anyway, long story shore, after I complained that these guys were my guests, they let them, and me in.
I had to cover up my Burnley polo shirt (I thought it looked quite smart and I had especially changed into it because I had my 1962 Wembley replica claret shirt on, but panicked because I thought it could be a bad omen. Afterall I needed to keep that shirt for the Wembley final and I did have my lucky black socks on so we would be ok)
Anyway, back to the tale.
5 quick Guiness' later we were ready for the off. the bar was chocker with Reading fans, all in thier QPR look-a-like tops.
Only a 200 yard walk to the stand, and we get interviewed by BBC Radio Berkshire (I'll have to see if they have a podcast)
No shouting, no swearing (please lads, you are live on air so keep it clean), with JTC taking the limelight .
BBC Interviewer says what a great interview and what a great set of fans Burnley have.
100 yards later and we are in front of the camera's. Kev is a pushy git so he gets the interview.
Stopped at the turnstiles, yellow little jobs worth says no camera's. something about copyright. What bollock....
Anyhow, luckily there were some Burnley coppers there and one on them has a son that works for my mate so we hand him the cameras.
Inside, every man and his dog have got camera's WTF was that all about.
The game is pertty much a blur, except for the goals and sweet jesus, the celebrations.
The Claret fans, we were amazing. the noise was unbelievable and that shot by Patto, i swear it was sucked in by the fans behind the goal.
we got 2,100 tickets, shite really but there ya go. so only 19,000 fans there meant Reading had 3,000 empty seats and you could see them everywhere.

Sell all your tickets
You couldn't sell or your tickets
Sell all your tiiiiiickets
You couldn't sell all your tickets.

That last 30 minutes was crazy, my head wanted to explode and I had this headache, you know the type you get in your eye when you eat ice cream to fast. The last ten minutes was even worse, voice was completely shot, head was buzzing and you could feel the concrete stand bouncing.

20 minutes before the final whistle the Reading fans were going home and by the time the whistle finally came more then half were already gone and the rest shot out of there like rabbits.

We just kept on singing, Blackwell was in the sky interview box just to the side of us, so a quick 1/2 hour rendition of Wanker, Wanker Wanker followed by Cheap clone of Warnock, You're just a cheap clone of Warnock. Cheap clone of Warrrnock, you're just a cheap clone of Warnock.

Great effort by the few Reading fans who stayed on after the whistle to applaud the Burnley fans.
Surreal to see the Reading team come back out to do a lap of honour to a near empty stadium (except for 2,100 crazy clarets)
Anyway, lap they did, applauding the maybe 500 reading faithful. (At this time i have to say it was a pretty shite effort by the rest of the so called Reading fans who couldn't be bothered to wait to say cheers on thier last game of the season)
So when the reading team reached the Burnley end, they stopped and gave us a clap, to which we respectfully responded with a chant of "bring out the Burnley" and of course "you'll always be a claret" to Glen Little (sidenote: Little played 7 years for Burnley and was an absolute hero there, before he buggered off on a free to Reading)
Daft buggers, they lined up a row of Stewards right in front of the claret fans, with a row of police, complete with riot gear about 10 yards further back. Not one, repeat, not one claret fan tried to get on the pitch, unlike the idiot Reading fan who decided he was going to race over to take us all on before falling flat on his arse (now that was funny)
1/2 an hour had gone since all the Reading fans had left, and the Burnley fans were still singing.
Announcement 1, "Will all Burnely fans please leave the staduim"
Response: "We're not going home, we're not going home, we're not going, we're not going, we're not going home."
Announcement 2. Same
Response. Same
and so on.............
3/4 hour later.
Announcement 7 or 8 or whatever " Please note, the lights in the stadium will be turned off in two minute"
Response: "Sing in the dark, we're gonna sing in the dark. Sing in the daaaaaark, we're gonna sing in the darrrrarrk."

Finally we all leave and about ten of us go back to the hotel where man mountain hulk hogen says we can go into the bar as long as we don't wind up the Reading fans.
4 or 5 more guiness', followed by a few Sambuccas and then onto the Champers.
By this time about 20 or 30 other Clarets fans who were staying at the hotel joined us and when we finally persuaded the staff to put on Skysports, we broke into a rendition of claret songs, with, JTC who had given the good behaviour guarantee, trying to keep things low key.
A few Reading fans came over and joined in with the chat and the free champers, except for two saddos who complained that "this is our bar"

Pissed, really, really pissed, me and Mrs JTC finally rolled off to bead about 2:30 ish, I say 2:30 ish because I really have no idea.

Next morning, we watch a replay of the game on Sky, check out (which means I pay the bar bill, $650.00 and head home

But what a night, what a f**king night.

[JK]

LMAOm thats a cracker of a story Johnnyboy, congrats mate ... Im another on the Claret-train and hope you get your wish at Wembley!!

[am Bays]

Yeah great read JTC I might copy and paste this to a women I work with who is a newly arrived immigrant (5 years) but misses her soccer culture standing on the terraces at Derby.

In the meantime working in health I'll do a ring around to see if their are any spare livers on ice here in Adelaide. I'm thinking if Burnley do win at Wembley you're gonna need it...