Jack Cork at a loss to explain Burnley FC’s away form

JACK Cork admits he was at a loss to explain Saturday’s defeat at Coventry.

Back at the club where the Chelsea midfielder spent the first half of last season on loan, Burnley saw their travel sickness strike again, courtesy of Michael Doyle’s second half strike.

The loss saw the Clarets drop out of the play-off places, down to 10th, but it was the manner of the setback which was most galling, and Cork said: “It wasn’t the best of games, there wasn’t much football being played and we didn’t play as well as we could have.

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“The goal that killed us was one of few chances that was actually in the game.

“We’re disappointed in there because we’re trying to talk about what the problems are and try to work out what went wrong.

“We don’t know what’s wrong.

“We’ve talked about it but we obviously haven’t found the answer yet.

“We’ve just got to keep trying to improve for the next game.

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“Performances have been really good. It’s the first game we’ve lost in quite a few games now.

“We’ve just got to try to keep working on it and get that (win) sorted away from home.”

Burnley have failed to win in nine away games so far this season - having won only once in 31 league games on the road in total.

But Cork feels the players can bounce back on home turf against Derby County in front of the cameras on Saturday night: “When you lose a game it’s always a bit down but the boys know we’ve got enough talented players and good players in there to try to get us back up there again.

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“We’ve dropped a few places in the table but hopefully we’ll get straight back in to the play-off places again next week.

“You can see how tight it is but this league’s tight every year.

“With a couple of wins you can be back up there.”

Cork is scratching his head at the difference in Burnley’s points return away from home, compared to at Turf Moor, as he belives there isn’t a different approach on the road: “We always set the same formation out, we always go out to play the same way, we always go out to play football.

“For some reason we were hitting too many long balls in the last half an hour on Saturday.

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“We can’t go 1-0 down and start trying to change the way we play.

“It showed at the end because we didn’t really get any chances from anything.

“We’ve got to improve and try to get ready for the next game.”

Asked if he felt Burnley were positive enough on the day, he added: “Yes, I did.

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“We had a few little scraps and a few chances that we could have taken.

“Chris Eagles had a good chance in the first half.

“If you take your chances things are different anyway.

“That’s just football really. They scored and we lost. You can’t really complain.”

Cork was withdrawn with a quarter of the game remaining to make way for Ross Wallace, prompting chants of “You don’t know what you’re doing” from the visiting fans, aimed at manager Brian Laws, and Cork was surprised: “I wasn’t expecting that. I just do whatever the manager says. I don’t mind coming off as long as it’s to help the team.

“You’re always gutted when you come off but I wasn’t too bothered as long as it was the right thing for the team.”