Burnley have bounced straight back up to the Premier League and Scott Parker has detailed the task facing them to stay up
Scott Parker admits Burnley face a “massive challenge” to survive in the Premier League next season after winning promotion. But the Clarets boss is bullish about their chances because of what they have overcome to bounce straight back up and secure their fifth Premier League promotion in 16 years.
“For sure, it’ll be tough and that’s been proven over the course of the last few years,” he said. “There’s a massive challenge for us next year. There was a massive challenge this year, which we managed to conquer, so let’s give it a go.”
Burnley’s biggest positive is their mean defence and they have conceded a Championship record low 15 goals in 44 games.
James Trafford has 29 clean sheets and they have gone 31 league games unbeaten. Burnley were far too open last season in the Premier League under Vincent Kompany and Parker has made them much harder to beat.
His worry is hanging on to Trafford and centre-half duo Maxime Esteve and CK Egan-Riley and the trio have Premier League suitors. Burnley also risk losing captain and 16-goal top scorer Josh Brownhill and the midfielder has refused to sign a new deal with his contract due to expire in June.
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Losing him would be a hammer blow and Brownhill is having the best season of his career. Goals are a concern for Parker and on-loan Millwall striker Zian Flemming works extremely hard leading the line, but only has 10 league goals in 34 appearances. South Africa forward Lyle Foster continues to struggle with fitness and form and Parker will need a regular goalscorer in the Premier League.
Burnley spent nearly £100million when they last came up under Kompany in 2023 and they must spend more wisely after some of that outlay was wasted on the likes of Mike Tresor and Aaron Ramsey.
Parker knows challenges lie ahead and he is determined to savour his third promotion in five years after having to rebuild his squad at the end of August as 17 players left and 16 arrived.
“I always believed, but yeah, for sure, there were some tough times,” he said. “Players leaving, players who didn’t want to be here, exiting 12 hours before a game. These were the things, and these were the scenarios that we were going on and we needed to react quickly to that.
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“Players coming in, wholesale changes. We needed to unite a group of men together to be on a sole mission this year, which we’ve managed to do. There was a lot of hard work, there was some adversity, there were some bump, there was some criticism. “It’s all part of the journey and that criticism probably brought us stronger together. That was probably a blessing, to be honest with looking back, and it’s got us to this point.”
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