Scott Parker outlines the 'biggest challenges' he will face as Burnley boss this season

It comes after the Clarets suffered a heavy 5-1 defeat to Manchester City at the weekend, a scoreline that doesn’t necessarily reflect how the game panned out.

Coming off the back of recent heartache against both Manchester United and Liverpool, where Burnley were beaten by penalties deep into stoppage-time, Parker is well aware he’s going to have keep the spirits up among his players this season.

Disappointment is inevitable coming up against sides with huge class, but having only lost twice in the Championship last season, Burnley aren’t used to being beaten.

But Parker, whose side have faced a gruelling start to the season in terms of the sides they’ve had to face, is confident the Clarets will keep their chins up and will remain competitive.

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“They’re going to be my biggest challenges this year,” the Clarets boss said.

“You look at the fixtures we’ve had to start the season, they’ve been some really tough fixtures.

“There are massive positives from those fixtures, but we’ve been given some hammer blows and some knockout punches in Man Utd away in the last minute, Liverpool too and then the Man City game in terms of the scoreline.

“I’m not saying we were worthy of winning the game, but certainly our performance at times there were huge positives and it didn’t reflect the actual scoreline.

“That’s something I will have to manage, for sure. Anyone sitting in my position that is having to manage a team, I’m very conscious of that and I was from the start of the season and I constantly say that to the players.

“We’ve got some real core foundations and a real understanding of what the journey may look like at times, and I’m often one that takes a lot of positives and sees certain negatives and I see them in every fixture.

“But we will keep going, we will keep trying to perform like we did. Because if we keep performing like this, we will be hugely competitive this year.

“Anyone coming into this stadium and seeing a team that has just come up from the Championship coming to the Etihad with the class and quality Man City possess, you see a brave team and a good team at times.

“You see a team that can really execute and has an endeavour about them. For that, I take massive, massive positives from.”

Having faced Tottenham, Man Utd, Liverpool and now Man City in their opening six games, Burnley’s fixture list does begin to ease from now onwards – although a tricky trip to Aston Villa awaits this weekend.

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