Tipped for an immediate relegation in their first ever second tier season, Burton have maintained the momentum of successive promotions to take notable scalps so far. Brewer Steve Eyley tells LFW how they’re doing it.
A remarkable achievement to make the Championship so soon after coming up from non league, how has it been achieved?
SE: Hard work, careful planning, not getting carried away financially. Living within our means and being run by a local man with a proven track record of doing what's right for the club have helped. It's not novel but it's certainly been effective.
We've had three promotions in seven years, two of them back-to-back, so it's obviously worked. Ever since Nigel Clough's first arrival in 1998, it has been all about steady progress, nothing flashy, being financially sensible and let's see what happens.
We were a moderate-sized club in the Conference, small by League Two standards, very small by League One standards and I can't really remember a club of our small size - under 7,000 capacity - making it to the Championship, so we have been 'Little Burton', the underdogs, for years. It just makes every win that little bit more satisfying.
What were the key factors behind last year's promotion?
SE: As you've no doubt found out, it's defence first, second and third for Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink. As with the League Two title win, we kept it very tight, and usually had just enough going forward to nick a win. We breezed through League One last season, to a degree that surprised me, as I felt that we would need to have more of an attacking threat to succeed. But we chipped in with goals from all over the pitch, which was just as well as we didn't have any prolific strikers.
Nigel Clough initially introduced a little more flair but in the final third of the season we went back to basics to get us over the line.
What has Nigel Clough changed and done well since he came in?
SE: What has impressed me this season is that we have ditched the defensive 4-5-1 formation set up by Jimmy and gone for an attacking 3-5-2 look. This has seen us going for it in just about every match, scoring plenty of goals initially - although it has dried up a bit in recent weeks - and entertaining our fans.
At the risk of sounding like an ungrateful bastard, 'entertaining' is not really a word you would associate with the last two promotions. We did what we had to do - and we did it well.
If we do end up going down, I believe we are going to give it a good go this season and I've found that really refreshing, so hats off to Nigel for that. He knows the Championship well, is under no illusions about how tough a task this is, and knows you can't spend 46 games with everyone behind the ball, hoping to do just enough to stay up.
Assess your start to the Championship, seems to be going well...
SE: Saturday's 3-1 loss to Norwich was our heaviest defeat this season. Apart from that one, we could have got something out of every game so far. The wins against Sheffield Wednesday and particularly Derby were memorable. Most never thought we'd play Derby competitively in the league - when they had their disastrous season in the Premier League last time out we were still in the Conference - and we went and turned them over.
I had low expectations for this season as we are so out of our depth financially against the big boys but I have seen encouraging signs. We haven't had any thumpings and have surprised one or two people. The first away win will be a massive boost. We were seconds from earning one at Fulham. We can kick on once we get that.
We are still favourites to go down - of course we are - and there's still a surreal feeling to us being in this league, although we have to remind ourselves that we are here on merit, not on some sort of work placement scheme.
It's a long old season but there is promise there, as long as we keep people fit. Injuries have already started to bite and we do not have a big squad. Also, the fact we can't sign anyone on loan until January is not helpful as loan deals are vital for a club like ours, but we will keep battling, get what we can on the road and
hope our home form gains enough points.
Summer transfer business?
SE: We actually brought in almost a dozen players. The manager has mixed and matched well, as far as I can see.
Clough has brought in a few on long term loans (strikers Chris O'Grady from Brighton and Jamie Ward from Forest), plus he signed some wily old campaigners in midfield in Lee Williamson and Lloyd Dyer.
We broke the club transfer record twice in three days to sign a very handy defender Kyle McFadzean from MK Dons and then box-to-box Aussie midfielder Jackson Irvine, from Ross County. He has nabbed four goals so far, our top scorer.
We've also signed massive defender Ben Turner from Cardiff, young striker Will Miller on loan from Spurs, got talented young Leicester midfielder Hamza Choudhury back for a longer loan spell after his success with last season, plus a few other young lads - and of course there was the surprise of seeing Shaun Barker come on for about ten seconds against the Rams after many years out. He's on board now.
Style of play?
SE: Mainly attacking. We seem to be aiming to score one more than the opposition. The 4-3 opening day defeat at Forest set the tone. We went for it - so did they - and we should have had a fourth right at the death. My main fear is a possible lack of goals up front. I'm a fan of Chris O'Grady: he has shown many excellent qualities but has not scored yet, nor has he really looked like doing so. A lot rests on Jamie Ward and Lucas Akins. Fortunately, we have scored plenty of goals from midfield so far.
There won't be any off the field distractions as we are financially solid and the chairman and manager form a mutual appreciation society. When we won League Two, the chairman managed to slip in some praise for Clough in a radio interview, a full six years after he'd left the club.
We have a tight knit bunch, they will battle until the very end. We also have the strange mix of the smallest ground in the league but the best training facilities in the league - and presumably the country - as we train at St George's Park.
JFH is coming under fire at QPR for negative, defensive, quite dull football. Reassure us there's more to him than this.
SE: Nope, that's about all we saw from him. Dour but very effective - for us. Kept expecting a striker of his calibre to bring in a full hand of explosive forwards, but he never did. He built his success on the defence.
Aims for this season and beyond?
SE: Anything other than relegation will be phenomenal, let's be honest. Everyone outside the club had written us off before the season began. You can understand why. In a league full of clubs the size of Newcastle, Sheffield Wednesday, Derby, Villa, Leeds, Norwich, Birmingham, Forest, and yes, QPR, we're hardly playing on a level playing field financially.
I cannot stress enough what an amazing achievement this has been for a club of our size and I'm kind of surprised there's not been more made of it by the national media.
But as Leicester proved last season, it's a funny old game and you never know, we could survive. There are clearly no easy games for us and we will have to operating at full tilt to survive but who knows, we just might.
We need another win soon though. We have gone from being five unbeaten to now being four without a win in the blink of an eye, thanks to consecutive defeats.
I've been watching the Albion for 34 years and have never seen us relegated so I really don't want to break my duck. But if we do go down, and we've given it our best, and are in a position to possibly bounce back, then it won't be catastrophic, in the way it is for some less well-run clubs.
Beyond this season, if we stay up, the aim will be the same for the following season - survival - and so and so on.
The Twitter @SteveEyley1, @loftforwords
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