English Premier League: Burnley narrowly beat Stoke City 1-0 in Turf Moor

One goal versus no answer, that’s all it took for Burnley to take all the points against Stoke City and move into the top-four on the Premier League table.

All sorts of trouble for Mark Hughes and his underperforming, Stoke City. All looked fine before the stroke of halftime, with the score level and nobody finding any break through.

It took a magical substitution in Barnes to take Burnley all the way. Burnley has made a habit of one goal victories. The way Sean Dyche has set up his defense has proven to be far better than many other teams sitting in the top half the table.

Last night’s victory makes it seven games won by this narrow margin. The clean sheet also means only Man City and Man United have conceded less goals (11) ahead of The Clarets (12).

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On the other end of the pitch the away side tried their best to come away with a point, but were unable to deal with a last minutes substitute and fell victim to the Burnley curse.

Hughes must be sweating buckets of water after another defeat. It puts them in a dangerous position on the league table. Only a few points above the drop – could signal the end of an era in Hughes. Stoke have conceded 12 goals in their last five encounters, expressing exactly why they’ve been doing so badly – winning only one game of those last five matches questions their performances even more.

The Potters season plus their results has been all over the place with no consistency. Or rather they’ve been consistently bad at everything. You choose.

Burnley player ratings:

Goalkeeper: Pope (GK) – 7.4

Defence:  Bardsley (RB) – 6.7; Long (CB) – 7.6; Tarkowski (CB) – 8.6;  Ward (LB) – 6.4

Midfield: Gudmundsson (RM) – 7.0; Cork (CM) – 6.6; Defour (CM) – 7.4; Arfield (LM) – 7.8; Hendrick (CAM) – 6.1  

Forwards:  – Wood (CF) – 6.1

Substitutions: Vokes – 6.2; Barnes – 7.2; Taylor – 6.3

Stoke City player ratings:

Goalkeeper:   –  Butland (GK) – 5.8

Defence:   Diouf (RWB) – 6.8; Cameron (RCB) – 6.1; Shawcross (CB) – 7.3; Zouma – 7.6;  – 

Midfield: Fletcher (CM) – 6.0; Allen (CM)– 7.1; Shaqiri (CAM) – 6.7; Sobhi (CAM) – 7.1

Forwards: Crouch (CF) – 7.3

Substitutions: Choupo-Moting – 6.3; Wimmer – 6.8;

Player ratings and match stats taken from WhoScored.com.

Burnley and Stoke City match stats:

Stoke City

1

Goals

0

51%Possession49%

63%

Pass Accuracy

63%

10Total Shots12

2

Shots on Target

7

6Corners4

14

Tackles

17

4Offsides2

6

Fouls

14

0Yellow Cards0

0

Red Cards

0