STAN Ternent was delighted that his side extended the celebrations at Turf Moor yesterday by coming from behind to clinch a thrilling 3-2 victory over Oxford United.

After the pre-match parade of Burnley's legends of the past and the official opening of the Jimmy McIlroy stand, the main course looked poised to turn sour when Oxford led 2-1 with just 11 minutes left.

But Andy Payton kept to the script by notching a hat-trick, including the last-minute winner.

"It went through my mind that we would perhaps be the only ones to perhaps spoil the party.

"But all's well that ends well and everything turned out okay in the end," Ternent admitted.

Burnley bounced back from their Boxing Day defeat at Bury having made three changes to the side, including the return of central defender Mitchell Thomas after flu.

"Mitchell was at the doctors at 11 o'clock in the morning, the physio came up to my house just after that and I decided I would play him.

"He wanted to play and he did extremely well," added Ternent, who also recalled Paul Cook but got just 45 minutes out of the schemer, who Burnley will hope is not the next on the sicklist.

The Clarets boss explained: "He was just worn out. He said there was nothing in the tank so I made the change and I felt if we could just get a bit more width on both sides then we could cause them some problems.

"And then of course they got a corner and scored so I had to change it round a little bit again but in the end we were worthy winners." Oxford chief Mickey Lewis was naturally frustrated at leaving Turf Moor empty-handed.

He also felt his side had the rough end of two possible handball decisions in each penalty area, one preceding Payton's winner, although to his credit he didn't harp on about either verdict.

Lewis said: "It was a really good game and it's just a shame that we got done in the last minute.

"We let ourselves down in the last five minutes just from corners. But we had opportunities to go 3-1 up and that would have killed it.

"We played as well as we have done and we were playing against one of the best teams in the league. They have got some good players. The lad Glen Little looks a hell of a good player."

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