WHEN I start to get my stuff together for match-day I do a mental checklist.

Lap-top - check! Notebook - check! Mobile - check! Stop-watch - check! Pens - check! Recent programme - check!

But now I have to add another. Calculator - check! To be honest I can no longer rely on my fingers and thumbs to keep up.

If there are just two goals at Highfield Road on Saturday the Clarets will have achieved what only Michael Vaughan managed in the recent Ashes series - they will have got their ton up.

Only if two goals come quicker in the match between Torquay and Bury can the Plainmoor side deny the Clarets the "honour" of being first past that milestone.

Of course it would be a real honour if you achieved that mark with a healthy plus figure in the goal difference column but, sadly for all at Turf Moor, they are showing a deficit.

One hundred goals represents a tremendous slab of entertainment and there can be no complaints about value for money.

I can almost see the marketing drive now.

"Come see the Clarets - where the goals flow like fine wine!"

"More goals, more drama - it must be Turf Moor!"

"Come and watch Burnley - play spot the defence."

It is the nature of football fans that they are forced to adopt gallows humour in times of trouble. I can just imagine the conversations on Saturday night. They were likely to start with the head-scratching, continue with a bit of moaning and then disintegrate into hysterical laughter on the principle that if you didn't laugh, chances are you would cry.

Some of the defending from Burnley has been, well, indefensible this season and to his credit Stan Ternent has acknowledged that.

But the Burnley boss has also stressed that the more adventurous tactics employed in the last two seasons are the best way forward.

On the many occasions when the likes of Robbie Blake and Glen Little have been in full flow, there are few Burnley fans who would disagree that seeing them pour forward is a great spectacle.

But attack has come at a cost although perhaps one of the most baffling aspects is that there have also been a number of extremely solid defensive displays.

Burnley let in six at Grimsby just ten days after they got rave reviews for being the first side to shut out Leicester at their new Walkers Stadium.

They conceded another half dozen at home to Rotherham when the previous two league games at Turf Moor had seen them send high-flying Norwich and Forest away with no points and no goals.

There is no doubt that there are enough players in the squad who know how to defend, even with Steve Davis stuck in the treatment room.

What Ternent needs to find is a cure for the collective amnesia that sees too many of his side forget the basics at the same time. If he can discover the key to that riddle, perhaps I will be able to forget my calculator for the rest of the season.