Burnley caretaker boss Mike Jackson says relegation pain ‘will always be there’

Burnley’s caretaker manager Mike Jackson said he did not expect the pain of relegation to ever go away after a final-day 2-1 defeat to Newcastle ended the club’s six-year stay in the Premier League.

The Clarets began the day needing to match Leeds’ result at Brentford but fell 2-0 down to goals from Callum Wilson – the first from the penalty spot after an inexplicable Nathan Collins handball – before Maxwel Cornet’s 69th-minute strike sparked a late fightback which fell short as Leeds’ win condemned Burnley to the drop.

Jackson, who replaced Sean Dyche last month, had made Burnley favourites to avoid the drop, taking 11 points from seven games prior to this, but could not clear the final hurdle.

“Suffer,” Jackson said when asked what he would do next. “That won’t go away for a long, long time. In fact it won’t. It will always be there. It’s something I’ll have to live with that won’t go away…

“It’s really raw at the moment. I’m gutted for the group, the fans, the staff. It’s hard to find the words sometimes. They’ve given it everything and that’s all you can ask of anybody.”

Having put themselves within touching distance of safety, Burnley wilted under the pressure on the final day, the first-half full of errors as they appeared hurried, even panicked, in their play.

“I think it was a bit edgy but I don’t think there was much in the game,” Jackson said. “I think you’re going to get those misplaced passes. I didn’t see anything in it until the penalty and from then it was two teams scrapping it out.”

The penalty incident was undoubtedly a poor one. Collins, 21, has proven an able deputy for injured captain Ben Mee but would struggle to explain why he reached out an arm after Nick Pope had averted the danger from a corner.