Wolves 2 Burnley 0
AROUND the hour mark, a little voice from directly behind me piped up, writes DARREN BENTLEY.
"Dad, are we winning?" quizzed the blond-haired boy, who could have been no more than four-years-old.
Almost embarrassingly, his dad reassured him that all was well with the world and yes, indeed, the Wolves were winning.
The apologetic reply was wholly in-keeping with matters on the field as Burnley somehow found themselves trailing to Kenny Miller's 48th minute strike after what, if it had been a boxing match, would have been a clear points victory for Burnley.
Unfortunately, in this game points do not make prizes - goals do - and the ragged crowd favourites had punched their way out of a corner to land a sucker punch on the gritty underdog.
Quite how this game slipped form Burnley's grasp is a mystery. A bold, adventurous, attacking line-up produced an opening 45 minutes unequalled by the Clarets anywhere this season, and if Dave Jones's men had returned to the locker room two goals down few inside Molineux could have argued.
But bad misses, cruel fortune and inspired goalkeeping all combined to keep Burnley at bay. And, as Stan Ternent succinctly put it in his post-match assessment: Goals change games.
So where Burnley had thrown punches galore and failed to land a killer blow, Wolves bloodied Burnley noses with the first genuine effort of note they pieced together all night.
And when Joey Craddock bulleted home a late header, that was simply the death knell to a classic match-up that, for a tantalising while, had upset written all over it.
Burnley hit their opponents with all they could muster from the first bell, when Robbie Blake tested Michael Oakes with less than a minute gone.
The Clarets were briefly indebted to Ian Moore in the opening sparring, twice popping in the unlikely position of last defender from two corners to cover a Brian Jensen mistake and Paul Ince's well-struck volley.
But within seconds of that last clearance, Moore popped up at the right end to latch onto Blake's slide-rule pass and rifle in a shot that was deflected agonisingly wide with Oakes stranded.
That man Moore was everywhere, and he came within as whisker of firing Burnley ahead with the best move of the game on 18 minutes.
Glen Little, a welcome addition to the depleted ranks following a frustrating spell at Bolton, mesmerised three defenders before feeding the ever-willing Dean West on the overlap.
The right back's deep cross found Facey and, from his clever knock down, Moore spun and hooked a shot over his shoulder that Oakes brilliantly palmed round the post at full stretch for a corner.
Burnley were now revelling in their pomp as they made the hosts look decidedly ordinary. Facey oozed confidence as he nonchalantly picked up the ball on the left and fizzed a rising drive inches over with Oakes worried.
Moore then failed to connect properly with another terrific West cross, but perhaps the best chance of a simply sensational spell of attacking football fell to Facey, who really should have found the target with a powering header from 12 yards after Little and Moore combined well down the right.
Finally, enough was enough and the Premiership side were stung into action in the final 10 minutes of the half.
Arthur Gnohere was at his most alert to deny Kenny Miller a certain goal from Steffen Iversen's cushioned header and Lee Naylor fired a bullet from distance straight into Jensen's midriff.
But normal service was soon resumed, with Blake latching onto Little's jaw-dropping ball and feeding Moore, whose rising, first time drive across Oakes was just about smothered at the second attempt.
Somehow though you feared the worst, especially since Wolves had been battered in the first half against Leicester at the weekend and responded to having their backsides tanned by serving up a four-goal salvo to cancel out a three-goal deficit. And so it proved.
Alex Rae replaced the ineffective Ince at half-time - presumably to add more bite to an overrun midfield.
And Jensen needed to be on his toes within 40 seconds to deny livewire wide man Henri Camara. But just two minutes later the Senegalese World Cup star showed West a clean pair of heels, sprinted fully 50 yards and crossed low for the unmarked Miller to nudge the ball over the line for his first goal since May's play-off final victory over Sheffield United. Typical!
That was a painful low blow after all that hard work, and Craddock should have added a second to seal the game after Jensen patted the ball off Iversen's head.
But battling Burnley came off the ropes after a 15 minute battering and suddenly Oakes was pulling off another top drawer save - this time with his legs - as Blake pounced on Facey's great assist.
The double swap of Lee Roche and Gareth Farrelly for West and Chaplow kept the battle raging - and the ding-dong affair continued as both sides slugged it out toe-to-toe.
Facey flashed a shot straight across the six-yard box and at the opposite end Mo Camara epitomised the role of skipper for the night with a magnificent clearance when namesake Henri seemed certain to wrap things up.
So it was such cruel luck on Camara and the Clarets when Silas swung over the resulting corner and Craddock outmuscled Graham Branch to thump home his first Wolves strike with a diving header.
Round one of an absorbing contest had undoubtedly gone to Burnley. Unfortunately, only Wolves will see round four!
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