‘We’ve got players who care’ - Burnley midfielder Stock

Burnley go to Wolves tomorrow needing a win to be mathematically safe from the drop - although a combination of results elsewhere could keep them up regardless.

For Stock, it is the second successive season he has fought relegation from the Championship, although it was a forlorn battle with Doncaster Rovers, who went down with three games remaining.

Rovers used 40 players in the league as their experiment with short-term loans - including El Hadji Diouf, Frédéric Piquionne and Habib Beye - failed, and Stock said: “You need characters in the team. Unfortunately we never had that at Doncaster when we really needed it most.

“But it’s totally different here, we’ve got players who care about the club, care about their futures and have got a lot of pride in themselves.

“No-one’s ever given up, although results sometimes haven’t gone our way and sometimes performances haven’t gone our way, but that happens to the best of teams.

“The one thing we have done is give everything we’ve got, we’ve never given up, and with two games to go we’ve got to continue that.”

Stock feels a point at home to Cardiff last Saturday was a crucial result, which left the Clarets four points clear of the trapdoor: “I’d be surprised if with 55 points we were to go down. You could see the relief when David Edgar scored that header, it totally lifted all the players and especially the supporters.

“It’s been difficult in recent weeks, the results haven’t been the best but we’ve stayed together as a squad and I think that was evident coming back against the league winners, we certainly didn’t give up.

“I think if you asked everyone individually they’d be lying if they said they hadn’t been looking over their shoulder or been a little bit nervous at times. I heard a stat the other day that the bottom six teams have got better form than the top six teams, which is just unbelievable. I’ve never been involved in a season like it. In recent years we’d have been safe two or three weeks ago and maybe that little bit of pressure would have come off and we’d go out there with no fear. That might have made a difference in recent weeks.”

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