Dyche concerned over pitch

Sean Dyche has described the surface on which Burnley will play their Europa League qualifying play-off first leg against Olympiakos tonight as “not great”.

Olympiakos were granted special dispensation by Uefa over the surface, but the Clarets trained at Panionios’s Nea Smyrni Stadium rather than at the Giorgios Karaiskakis Stadium in order to give the latter as much protection as possible for tonight’s game.

Asked about the pitch, Dyche said: “It’s not great, but we knew that before we came. We were made aware that we’d have to train on an alternative surface, which they provided, which is equally not that great I’d say, but usable.

“We’ll have a light session in the morning, but obviously not here. This is certainly a pitch that will be interesting to see how it plays.

“It’s not ideal, but to be fair I’m sure this club don’t want it like that. We’re not too worried about it.”

Dyche was asked about comments made by Sam Allardyce on bein Sports, where the former Everton manager said Burnley did not have the squad to cope with playing in Europe as well as the Premier League.

Dyche said: “We want to take on the challenge. We’ve made that clear. It’s good for me as a manager who continues to learn, it’s good for the group. It’s well documented we have some injuries and we were looking for more bodies in the market and that didn’t happen. That’s the way it goes. We believe in the group we’ve got.”