Furious fans told me to ‘f*** off and die’ after we were relegated from Premier League.. but that wasn’t the worst part

1 year ago 113

ALAN PACE had to escape a hate mob yelling at him to “Eff off and go die” the last time he sat through a Premier League game.

That scary experience for the Burnley chairman marked his club’s relegation after a 2-1 home defeat by Newcastle.

After some sickening lows, Alan Pace is ready for some ‘special’ highs[/caption]

Burnley manager Vincent Kompany will instantly be locking horns with old boss Pep Guardiola in Friday night’s Prem opener at home to Man City[/caption]

Footage shows how shocked, shaken and speechless the son of a Mormon missionary was as he took refuge within a Turf Moor suite.

On Friday night, one record-busting promotion campaign later, he will feel a lot safer and far more secure.

For he and his fellow directors will be entertaining their Manchester City counterparts at the start of a new top-flight campaign with the good times back.

Pace’s appointment of Vincent Kompany as manager following that dark day, seen by many non-believers as a huge gamble, has proved to be inspired.

Yet those mad moments are still vivid inside the head of the American financier who led ALK Capital’s £170million takeover of the Clarets in December 2020.

He said: “To have people come up to the directors’ box on their way out and almost charge at the directors’ box, and yell and scream and tell you to eff off and go die.

“I don’t think people are really ready for that. I know I wasn’t.

“And then walking down the street and people are waving with one of their five fingers and yelling stuff.

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“The hardest part was being with family when people were telling us to go home. This is home, so I don’t know what they are saying.

“That was probably harder for the family than for me but we made the conscious effort when that happened to leave after a little while because it was not a good environment.”

The irony of the abuse directed at the Burnley supremo in May of last year is that his father had spread God’s word in the area as a young man.

His work formed a connection that was never broken even though Pace grew up in California.

He said: ‘We’re all members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, my partners and I.

“My father served as a missionary here for two years when he was 19.

“He spent time in Leeds, Preston and Manchester, where there is a history of the Mormon community.

“His experience while he was here was that, if you ever get the chance, you should live there and you need to have the opportunity to experience what is in the North West, different to other parts of the UK.

“So I remember that from the time when I was six or seven years old and all the different things that would come out about the UK.

“We had roast beef and Yorkshire pudding pretty much every Sunday.

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“The memories I have from him when he was alive was that this was a special part of the world and it had left a very, very big impression on him.

“I have met people who actually knew him as a 19-year-old when he was here and some of the stories and their impressions have been fantastic.”

First impressions by those who tried to run Pace out of town have now changed for the better.

A new Sky documentary called Mission to Burnley captures the scene as Pace reaches safety after the last-day drop, sits down at a table, and nervously takes out not one but three mobile phones.

Furious fans blamed him for the fall from Prem grace — and especially for his decision to sack revered ex-boss Sean Dyche with eight games to go on, of all days, Good Friday last year.

They feared the good times would never return and yet there is now redemption at a club transformed thanks to his and Kompany’s leadership.

There is a far more genuine smile on Pace’s face as the 53-year-old tells how life in Burnley is now a far happier experience, saying: “It is way better when things are going well! People have been very respectful and kind.

“A number of people have come up and apologised, which I’d never have expected. That has been amazing.

“I hope that what we do stands out to people as being something special and something that is always reflected upon as being more happy than sad, more joy than sorrow.

“That people will look back long after I’m gone and say: ‘Wow, that was a great time at the club — it was special’. I’d be happy with that.”