FINAL SCORE: Burnley 2 Wanderers 0
4:58pm Saturday 18th August 2012 in Latest By Marc Iles
Wanderers fluffed their lines miserably at Turf Moor to give Owen Coyle an unhappy return to his former club.
Despite starting brightly, the Whites lost their way completely by the midway point in the first half and goals from Martin Paterson and Charlie Austin made sure that life in the Championship got off to the worst possible start.
Wanderers only had themselves to blame for going in at the break a goal down.
They had made an impressive start, and Chung-Yong Lee should certainly have put them into the lead when Marvin Sordell smuggled him in, only for the winger to place a panicky shot just wide.
Martin Petrov then went close with a fizzing volley before things started to unravel for the Whites, who started to give possession away with alarming regularity.
They had already had a few warning shots, with Martin Paterson looping a shot on to the roof of the net and Adam Bogdan beating away Dean Marney's drive.
But they seized the advantage six minutes before the interval as shots from Marney and Junior Stanislas were blocked and Charlie Austin cushioned a header into the path of strike partner Paterson.
Wanderers appealed for offside – and replays show they had a case – but things were about to get worse as they failed completely to come out in the second half.
Clarets keeper Lee Grant almost gifted Chung-Yong an equaliser with a poor clearance but the South Korean winger failed to take advantage.
Burnley continued to carve out opportunities and after Austin had been denied once by Bogdan, he got a big slice of luck on 56 minutes as a great cross from Stanislas was hooked into his path by Tim Ream, causing the ball to bounce off the striker's chest and into the net.
But for Bogdan and some last ditch defending by Knight and Ream, it could have been more.
And it wasn't until the dying moments that Wanderers created anything else of note, as Knight's header was nodded off the line by Joe Mills.
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