Fleetwood Town man believes fans' absence has made a difference

Fleetwood Town's Wes Burns Picture: Stephen Buckley/PRiME Media Images Limited

Barring a handful of pilot matches last month, fans have been away from games since March with plans for a return in October having been put on hold.

An online petition calling for supporters to be allowed back into stadiums has had more than 100,000 signatures, the threshold for which it can be considered for debate in Parliament.

Fleetwood Town had been one of the clubs hoping to stage a test event, having earmarked the game with AFC Wimbledon a fortnight ago.

Even though fans are not at the grounds, Burns (pictured) believes they are still playing a part with their absence perhaps explaining some of the recent results that have been seen.

He said: “My opinion is that a lot of these big scorelines that you see, I don’t think they would happen if there were fans inside the stadium.

“I just think there’s an added pressure to defend and to not make mistakes.

“When I say make mistakes, I’m not saying we intentionally go out there to make mistakes but there’s always that little bit more on the game when there’s fans in the stadium or it’s on TV.

“It’s definitely not something that we’re getting used to and it can’t come back quick enough, getting fans back into the stadium to get behind us again.

“I know there was a lot of talk about them coming back at some point in October, but with Covid cases rising that’s not going to happen now.

“I wouldn’t say I’m following too much on the petition stuff but there is space for fans, always.”

When it comes to the pitch, the opposite is the case with patience needed.

Town have almost had to recruit a new defence and Burns said it will take time to come together.

He said: “We’ve lost a whole back three and Callum Connolly could play in the back three or in the midfield.

“So that’s four key players from our squad from last year that we’ve lost.

“We need to learn that we haven’t got those players with us any more and it’s about teaching the new lads that have come in to pick up the structures that we had before.

“I think we got lost in the new lads coming in and knowing what we’d want them to do, but we’ve learned that we have to go through that process again of teaching them on the training ground.”