From Hamilton to $30m Premier League man
Chris Wood continues to exceed every expectation in the English Premier League. Michael Burgess travelled to Burnley to unpack the secrets of his success.
Chris Wood is standing alone in a corridor inside Burnley’s Turf Moor base. He is wearing jeans, a club jacket and a weary expression, after duelling for 90 minutes — with no reward — against Crystal Palace.
It is a freezing Lancashire night and the All Whites captain probably has better things to do than front for an interview, especially after a frustrating defeat where he missed a point blank chance, labelled a turning point by Burnley manager Sean Dyche in the press conference.
But Wood, in the best traditions of Rudyard Kipling’s If, has never been one to hide from a difficult situation.
“It’s one of those,” Wood tells the Herald on Sunday. “Sometimes they go in, sometimes they don’t. But chances are going to come, and I had a couple cleared off the line. You look at the one I put over but that’s life in football. I can’t dwell on that because there’s always a chance around the corner — so I have to keep going.” And how he did.
Since that night last December, Wood has scored six goals from 16 starts, helping Burnley to ninth on the Premier League table, above Arsenal and Everton. The 28-year-old will end another remarkable season tomorrow, when Burnley host Brighton.
He has notched 13 goals, his third successive campaign with a doubledigit return and the most by a Burnley striker in the top flight since 1976. He’s found the net against nine clubs, including Manchester United, Leicester, Spurs and Wolves.
Superlatives are hard to find. This season, his scoring ratio is superior to Riyad Mahrez, Son Heung-Min and Alexandre Lacazette and his goals tally comparable with Sergio Aguero (16), Harry Kane (17) and Sadio Mane (17). He’s now scored more Premier League goals (33) than the likes of Juninho, Andrey Arshavin and David Ginola.
A Kiwi striker in the Premier League? That was almost impossible to imagine not so long ago. Now Wood is well established, and behind only Wynton Rufer as a scoring talent from this country.
Last month marked Wood’s 12th year in England. He left these shores as a 17-year-old for West Bromwich Albion, where his Waikatobased coach Roger Wilkinson had some connections.
A product of Onehunga Sports, Cambridge and Hamilton Wanderers, Wood had dreams but few expectations.
“I just wanted to enjoy it and see where it takes me,” reflects Wood. “I knew coming over here that just to be in the academy was tough work, let alone making the first team.
“I got some good breaks, a manager that liked me and a few injuries along the way which helped me get my start and get my legs in the first team.
“I didn’t have anything coming over; I just knew it was going to be a challenge, but a challenge that I was willing to take on.”
Wood’s progression through the English football tiers has been remarkable. He played at eight clubs — often on loan — and scored goals wherever he went, before a golden spell at Leeds in the Championship (44 goals in 88 games) prompted the move to Burnley in August 2017 for a club record fee (£15 million). How does he reflect on his career so far?
“With great pride and joy. I ended up living out my dream and there’s a lot more to come. It’s fantastic that I’ve been able to push and achieve what I’ve achieved in my career.”
Burnley is the smallest town in the Premier League, with a population of around 80,000 people. It’s 35km north of Manchester, with Blackburn and Preston to the west and Leeds an hour’s drive east.
“There’s not much here, lad, but we like it,” says the taxi driver, on the way to the training ground, a few miles from the railway station.
Journalists are gathered in the club’s media centre. The hot soup provided is appreciated on a chilly morning, while the squad practice out of sight on a distant field. Manager Dyche is in good spirits, coming off a 3-0 win at Watford. He’s popular here, admired for a knack of getting results on a modest budget. Burnley have overachieved in recent times but Dyche says the work never stops.
“[Maybe] we are making that look normal — but we know deep down it’s not,” says Dyche. “We know every game counts, every inch of every game counts. Football finds you out if you’re not on it all the time.”
On Wood, Dyche is effusive in his praise, noting his development.
“I’d done a lot of homework on him, seen him at all his varying clubs, the good spells, the not so good spells, so I knew a lot about his game. Then [since] he has been with us, you see it on a daily basis. He makes for a good story so far . . . and it is so far. I think he has a lot more to come.”
Dyche particularly admires Wood’s scoring instinct and intent.
“It’s not just his heading ability,” adds Dyche of the player who is equal top in the Premier League with goals from the air this season (five).
“He’s two footed, he’s got a variance of finish which I like; he can hit the power one, he can shape it and he can slide it in and he’s got a goal scorers’ knack. He can nick a goal out of nothing at times.”
Burnley fullback Charlie Taylor has played with Wood since 2015.
“I was with him at Leeds, so I know him better than a lot of people here,” says Taylor. “He’s got better season on season, the quality of his strikes, his goals, his all-round play. He’s not got to his prime yet, so can be a topclass striker in the Premier League for a good few years yet.”
The stadium is in the centre of town, and it’s a thing of beauty. With four banked grandstands and old-style turnstiles, you can feel the history. Burnley first ran out here in 1883 and only two English clubs, Stoke City and Preston North End, have been in continuous residence for a longer period.
The outside walls of the stadium are dedicated to Burnley legends, while inside reception, an honours board lists the club’s achievements. One of the 12 founding members of the Football League, Burnley have been champions of England twice (1920-21 and 1960-61).
They also finished league runnersup in 1962 — reaching the FA Cup final the same year — but have endured many tough times since then. The nadir was in 1987, when they narrowly escaped being relegated from the fourth division.
“For Burnley to be where they are is just amazing,” says Ian, a security guard. “Especially for those of us that remember the bad old days.”
From 1980 to 2000, Burnley bounced between the third and fourth tiers. In 2009, they returned to the Premier League — 33 years after they were last in the top flight — but went straight back down. There was another single season at the summit in 2014-15, before returning in 2016-17.
The club shop beside the stadium isn’t on the industrial scale of Anfield
or Old Trafford. Wood is prominent in their 2020 calendar and there are postcards and A4 photos of the Kiwi.
“He’s a good lad, your boy,” says the shop manager, adding that Wood has popped in a few times and is always friendly. “He’s done well here, really well.”
Seeking sustenance, I step into a pub across the road, one of several adjacent to the ground.
“Food? No, we don’t do food, luv,” says the barmaid. “You won’t find nowt round here. Just drinks.”
A customer instructs her to “mind me pint” and offers to walk me to Wetherspoon’s pub, about half a kilometre away.
Carl is “Burnley through and through”, pointing out the bus stop where his parents first met, across the road from the local night club. Work commitments mean he doesn’t usually go to matches but he understands the importance of Burnley FC.
“They lift the town,” he says. “It’s not the nicest place here, to be honest, and it can be a hard life. But the football team make everybody proud.”
That’s obvious on match day. The streets surrounding Turf Moor are packed with fans, almost all wearing replica tops. The surrounding pubs display signs saying ‘No away fans’ in their windows — to avoid trouble — but there’s a friendly atmosphere.
Inside the Royal Dyche pub, it’s heaving. A match day hub for Burnley fans, it was renamed in 2018, in honour of the popular manager.
Publican Justine Lorriman is a season ticket holder — “I dash to the game at five to three, and as soon as the final whistle goes, I run back and get behind the bar” — and has been impressed with Wood’s contribution.
Lifetime Clarets fan Colin, wearing a custom-made Hawaiian style Burnley shirt, is attending the match with his son. He’s a big fan of Wood, who “terrorises opposition defences”.
“He’s been really good for us,” says Colin. “I’d seen him [playing for] Leicester and Brighton, so you almost forget he’s a New Zealander. He’s one of us really, in disguise.”
Wood and the Burnley team arrive at the stadium just before 2pm, greeted by a throng of fans outside the gates.
The match day programme resembles a book (78 pages, £3) and features a smiling Wood on the back cover. Inside, the striker talks about his recent contract extension to 2023 (”it was a no-brainer”), his heading prowess and the relationship with strike partner Ashley Barnes, while also revealing that shirts from Sergio Ramos and Romelu Lukaku are prominent in his collection.
The match kicks off to a cacophony of noise. Wood has some nice early touches; combining well for a one-two pass with Barnes and providing another cushioned lay off for a shooting chance. But the home side struggle for rhythm and can’t get a foothold in midfield, and Crystal Palace take a deserved lead right on halftime, with Wilfried Zaha beating keeper Nick Pope at his near post.
Zaha continues to cause problems early in the second half, drawing an early yellow card, prompting chants of “You soft bastard”.
Burnley are pushing harder, but the visitors look sharper.
A flashpoint for Wood arrives in the 57th minute, as a miscued defensive header puts him through on goal. As the crowd rise in expectation, he blasts over the bar, from eight yards out on the angle. Wood holds his head in his hands, while the sense of shock around the ground reflects his reputation as an ace finisher.
But he recovers quickly, going close three minutes later with a header cleared off the line.
A defensive error opens the door for Palace to claim their second goal, as darkness descends on Turf Moor. Wood has one last chance late, drawing a sharp save.
“It’s a shame for your boy,” says one local scribe. “But he’s a strong lad Chris, he’ll be fine.”
And he was. Wood didn’t want to dwell on his miss, which was mentioned on BBC’s Match of the Day that night and labelled a golden chance in the Sunday newspapers.
“As I showed, you miss a big opportunity like that, but two minutes later, there is a headed opportunity you have to get on target,” says Wood. “If you’re not in the right headspace, you won’t get those chances, so you have to put it to the back of your mind, get it out of the way and carry on, because ultimately you will have more chances in that game, or the next one, to be ready for.”
And that was perfectly illustrated just 11 days ago, when Burnley were trailing 1-0 at home to Wolves. Wood missed a clearcut headed chance in the 93rd minute but then equalised from the penalty spot three minutes later to earn his side a draw.
“It was great mentality from Woody,” Dyche said. “When he missed that chance, it shows you what a strong character he is to step up and take the penalty and finish it in the style he did.”
Wood has found his ideal niche in Burnley, with a relationship of mutual affection with the fans. After more than 100 games for Burnley, does he have a favourite moment?
“Each season is different and has its highs and lows,” says Wood. “In my first season, to finish seventh was fantastic but we [also] went through a spell of 12 games without a win.
“You have your challenges and your tough moments [and] you enjoy the thrill of staying up and seeing how far you can go. It’s hard to nail down one particular moment. But any time I score for this club is fantastic because ultimately scoring in the Premier League was what I wanted to do when I was a kid growing up. To play out that dream is amazing.”