Burnley travel to face Sunderland at the Stadium of Light on Saturday.
Burnley’s Ashley Barnes shoots at goal
Ashley Barnes has suggested that Sunderland’s position in the Premier League means that they may actually give Burnley a tougher game on Saturday than top four chasers Liverpool did last weekend, the Daily Mirror reports.
The Clarets travel to the Stadium of Light looking to maintain or extend the amount of daylight between themselves and the bottom three in the top flight.
But Barnes has suggested that it will not be an easy task to gain a positive result given that Sunderland are situated at the bottom of the table and running out of time to pull off yet another great escape, and may actually prove to be harder for Burnley than the game at Anfield which Sean Dyche’s men lost 2-1.
“It could be tougher than Liverpool,” he said, as reported by the Mirror. “Sunderland are fighting for their lives and so are we, so it’s going to be a massive game.
“It will be a completely different game, sometimes you have to win ugly and we need to make sure we come away with the points.”
Sunderland players celebrate
With Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea still ahead for the Black Cats, David Moyes will surely be looking at the home game with Burnley as a must win if they hope to start clawing back the six points that separate them from safety.
And the atmosphere amongst the squad will undoubtedly be considerably better if they go into the international break having ended their run of three consecutive defeats – during which time, they have not scored a goal – and having started to make up some ground on some of the teams above the drop-zone.
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