Any serious commitment to following a professional football team across the country is certain to generate wildly fluctuating emotions. Happiness, frustration, despair, contentment, rage – feelings familiar to us all. City are no exception, and indeed it sometimes appears that their quest is to explore them all, in the most extreme fashion possible. For in the space of half a week, we have lurched madly from anger at QPR to a moment of unconstrained joy with that rarest and most precious of things: a last minute winner away from home.

You can go months, years even without experiencing that mad rush of delirium, where the delight is so intense that no quantity of shouting, screaming, flailing of limbs, hugging of strangers and general mad capering can do justice to the sensation of having your decision to travel justified by winning the game at the very end. Those who went to Burnley last night will smile for days at the gleeful memory of the match’s final act.

Following Saturday’s inexplicable collapse, Phil Brown opted to keep his own faith with most of that side, making only two changes – McPhee for Windass and Hughes for Okocha. It meant that at a cool, empty Turf Moor the Tigers lined up in a 4-4-2 formation staffed thus: Myhill; Ricketts, TurnerBrown, Delaney; Garcia, Marney, Ashbee, Hughes; McPhee, Campbell.

City started the game kicking towards the 600 or so citizens of the White Rose county, housed in a gloomy wooden-seated stand whose mature vintage looks starkly out of contrast with two of the new, plasticky stands. Still, the stewards permitted persistent standing and colourful language and the Tiger Nation was in robust spirits given Saturday’s dismal offering, so life wasn’t too bad.

City quickly looked the slicker outfit with our zippy strike partnership buzzing around Burnley’s solid but slow defence to maddening effect. The Tigers nearly opened the scoring with the first of the evening’s many clear opportunities when McPhee expertly played in Bryan Hughes, but jim-jam-sporting clown Gabor Kiraly raced from his line to block the shot.

Still, a heartening opening from a side whose confidence had evidently not taken too much of a knock from QPR – although at the far end, Burnley fashioned a couple of half-chances of their own, Gray and Wade sending long-range shots towards Myhill’s goal, though they generated only fleeting alarm.

Back at our end, City were continuing to look threatening, and Stephen McPhee had the ball in Kiraly’s goal after quarter of an hour when he latched onto a loose ball after a Hughes shot, but the flag was up – a contentious decision to our mind, although the protests were sufficiently timid as to suggest the linesman was correct.

It was good stuff though, lively attacking football played at pace, and City were the next to threaten when a Delaney shot required a smart intervention from the be-trousered comedian in goal. He was called into further action as the half drew to a close, a flying save denying a lovely shot from Garcia. However, despite crafting a few promising positions City went in at the break level, to a generous hand from the away fans.

Burnley would be a top away day with the addition of a few things. Firstly, a home crowd that makes a bit of noise. Granted, a home match on a chilly Tuesday night is never the optimum time, and with a crowd down into four figures, there were plenty of empty expanses for sound to drift over. One also suspects it’s one of those grounds where noise doesn’t easily transfer from one area to another – while the Tiger Nation was in a generally boisterous mood, one wonders how well it transmitted itself. Nonetheless, the quietude is a pity.

However…the pies were tasty, the beer queues were gratifyingly short and the stewards were tolerant of football fans being football fans. And the locals (again) belied their reputation by being friendly and welcoming in the splendidly cheap pre-match hostelry, so we shouldn’t grumble. We were, after all, about to witness a very pleasing forty-five minutes…

They started with Burnley looking a little livelier, presumably after Steve Cotterill sternly instructed his charges of the need to up their previously torpid game. He’d also withdrawn the hopeless Robbie Blake for Mahon. A sharp effort from McCann required an alert stop from Myhill early in the half. However, the pattern of the game remained broadly the same, with Burnley coughing up possession far too easily and City looking more inventive than their off-colour hosts.

A Hughes shot required another smart stop by Kiraly, by some distance the home team’s man of the match. However, Burnley came closest to opening the scoring when McCann ghosted into space and sent a looping header bouncing off the top of Myhill’s crossbar – a heart-stopping moment, and had we nearly trailed in a game we’d deserved to lead.

Our nemesis of old Ade Akinbiyi was introduced for Wade Elliott, but the reason for his benching was clear as he proved nowhere the menace of yesteryear and the imperious Turner comfortably shackled him. With ten minutes remaining and City increasingly dominant, Phil Brown made his first change by bringing off Hughes for Dean Windass – an aggressive move, and one should tip the cap to the manager for being enterprising instead of settling for a draw.

It meant that Garcia moved to the left with McPhee playing on the right with the Deano/Campbell partnership restored, and this duo provided one of the evening’s pivotal moments with five minutes remaining. Deano slipped Campbell into space and he zoomed off towards goal, looking certain to score. David Unsworth also recognised this, and he cynically brought down Campbell as he moved into shooting range.

From our perspective it appeared the referee had given a penalty in addition to Unsworth’s inevitable red card, however his initial arm signal proved misleading and City took a free-kick 18 yards from goal that was kept out.

However, shorn of a calming defensive influence Burnley went totally to pieces, and City tore into them searching for a winner. Stirring stuff, it is a rare treat indeed to see an away side piling forward for a winning goal with the match level.

Phil Brown sought to capitalise on Burnley’s desperation by withdrawing Campbell for Jay Jay Okocha, whose rubber-legged wiles had the home side beseeching Mr Foy to conclude the match. Instead, he indicated four additional minutes were to be played, and the Tiger Nation, scenting blood, urged a final onslaught.

And with the clock showing 91 minutes, we should have led. McPhee danced free of the defence and ran all alone towards Kiraly. He took the ball onto his left foot…shot…breath was held…the ball beat the keeper…a sharp pre-roar intake of air…and the ball rolled agonising wide. Nyaaarrrggghhhhh.

It felt as though the game had gone. Surely a side could not receive two such golden opportunities in injury time?

Pah.

In the ninety-third minute, we surged forward one final time, and won a corner. The initial kick was half-cleared, but only to Dean Marney. No arsing about from our new midfield hero, he sent the ball straight back – and there was Michael Turner, his marker evaded, the ball coming directly to him, and he thumped an unstoppable header past Kiraly.

The City fans went quite simply berserk, the support a single entity writhing, tumbling, screaming with fearsome intensity. The players celebrated with vigour of their own, and the game had barely enough left in it for thirty seconds of final action, entirely devoid of incident and the City players were soon able to salute their once-again-faithful public as they left the pitch to thunderous acclaim. Even Paul Duffen was sufficiently energised as to come over to give us a cheer.

We filed out into the Lancashire night to learn that City had moved back up to 13^th, with nineteen points from our opening fifteen games. More important than the league placing however was the restoration of faith among the support. QPR truly was a horror show. Burnley was the reparation. Even if we headed back to God’s country with a point, the debt to those who traipse across the land would have been repaid.

We really don’t ask for much, just a bit of commitment and as much entertaining football as individual circumstances permit. We got both at Turf Moor, and the temporary rupture in relations is most assuredly healed. And now we prepare to face struggling Preston at the Circle on Saturday. A win will see us into the top half ahead of the international break. An enticing prospect – and a perfectly plausible one. (AD)