FULL-TIME: Stoke City 2 Burnley 0

“It’s not rocket science,” he said, with confidence.

But when the midfielder’s missile came off the head of Stephen Jordan and into his own net, well, it was the stuff of nightmares for Danish goalkeeper Jensen and his fellow Premier League newcomers.

Defending the almost undefendable is easier said than done, and it served as a stark reminder, if one was needed, for how tough life is going to be at the top.

Another defensive switch-off at an earlier set-piece had given Stoke the perfect start to their second Premier League season.

Burnley are no strangers to staging comebacks having recovered to earn 25 points from losing positions in their promotion season, but they are already finding them much harder to achieve at this level.

And they learnt the hard way after gifting the first goal to Ryan Shawcross from a set piece before Jordan steered the ball beyond a hesitant Jensen.

Although disappointed and frustrated by the goals conceded, manager Owen Coyle was buoyed by the style of football his players produced for long spells, and openings created from it. And there might have been more of those had second half substitutes Chris Eagles and summer signing Fernando Guerrero been allowed more time to outwit the Potters’ fullbacks.

Record signing Steven Fletcher worked hard up front, bringing an excellent save from Thomas Sorensen early in the second half, Wade Elliott worked moments of magic in possession while Graham Alexander, captaining the side in the injured Steven Caldwell’s absence, marked his top flight bow with craft and guile.

Those positives will all need to come together when Manchester United stoke Burnley’s baptism of fire in the first home game on Wednesday night.

And Coyle will hope that the 3,000 travelling Clarets fans who witnessed history being made on Saturday will be able to replicate the atmosphere generated by their Staffordshire counterparts when the champions mark the return of top flight football to Turf Moor.

Stoke boss Tony Pulis, sporting a new, bright red baseball cap for the occasion, had pondered whether their famously loud home fans would be quite so vociferous in their second season.

A deafening roar from the Boothen End assured him their 12th man had not deserted them in the summer months.

But Burnley succeeded in turning the volume down on their bursts of ‘Delilah’ with a bright start.

The early onslaught they had perhaps anticipated going into the game hadn’t materialised, and by the 17th minute Coyle’s Premier League newcomers weren’t just surviving, they were holding their own. Robbie Blake had even fired a couple of warning shots.

But the lapses in concentration that they knew could hurt them reared their head when Tyrone Mears conceded a soft free kick for his challenge on Ricardo Fuller.

Clarke Carlisle lost his man the second the ball left Liam Lawrence’s foot near the left touchline, and an unmarked Shawcross towered to plant a header across Jensen.

Carlisle tried to make amends by sending Wade Elliott sprinting down the right channel with a long pass, but the midfielder was unable to pick out Fletcher at the far post and instead clipped the ball straight into Sorensen’s hands. Jensen’s countryman and opposite number grabbed hold of Blake’s looping free kick soon afterwards.

Burnley were seeing plenty of the ball, yet struggled to do anything meaningful with it. But Coyle, seeing that his players were trying to do the right things, continued to send encouragement from the dugout.

Their task was made twice as hard though just after the half-hour.

The absence of captain Caldwell had already rocked the defensive boat, before Delap put a dent in its stern.

With summer signing David Edgar and Michael Duff also unavailable to compete with the 6ft-plus might of Beattie, Fuller, Dave Kitson, Shawcross et al, Jordan was the obvious choice to partner Carlisle at centre half.

The former Manchester City full back, making his first Premier League start since May 2007, had done an admirable job on ex-Sheffield United striker Beattie at Bramall Lane last season, and succeeded in keeping the former Blackburn and Everton front man quiet again.

But Delap’s deliveries provided a different proposition, and as Jensen stopped his advance to meet it, Jordan rose above Beattie to get his head to it, only to glance it into his own net.

Carlisle avoided a third when he hooked former Preston front man Fuller’s looping header off the line.

Burnley ended the half with Blake’s poor free kick and failed penalty appeals for fullback Andy Wilkinson’s handball. Coyle had also called for a spot kick after an earlier push on Chris McCann. But, with United boss Sir Alex Ferguson eyeing up his next opponents from the stands, the Clarets began the second half in more positive fashion.

Eighty two days after Elliott cracked in the Wembley winner to send Burnley up, he almost scored their first in the Premier League, but narrowly cleared the bar with a wicked right-foot strike.

Abdoulaye Faye was booked for a late challenge on the former Bournemouth man as he sought out another forward path, and Stoke should have been reduced to 10 men four minutes later but his lunge on debutant Mears went unpunished.

Instead, Alexander was booked for dissent, and suffered increased frustration when Blake’s shot from his low free kick, and McCann’s follow-up, were blocked out before Blake and Fletcher both brought saves from Sorensen. The former was a quickly taken free kick that stuck to the Dane’s gloves, while a firm right wrist stopped £3million man Fletcher from making a goalscoring debut.

Like Faye, Jordan got a reprieve from referee Steve Bennett when he felled Matthew Etherington on the edge of the box.

Beattie fired the free kick high over before being replaced by Kitson, who was hit the post soon after his introduction.

Guerrero excited on the left, and was unlucky to see a looping cross-shot drop just wide of the far post.

But there was another let-off for the Clarets in stoppage time when substitute Richard Cresswell dragged a shot wide after breaking clear of the stumbling Mears.

Pulis offered a crumb of comfort afterwards.

“All the papers will write them off like they wrote us off,” he said.

“The most important thing is you dust yourself down and come back again. You mustn’t get too despondent with defeats.”

The Stoke boss speaks from experience after losing their first game after promotion, 3-1 at Bolton. They bounced back to beat Aston Villa 3-2 at home in the next game.

Burnley just have the small matter of hosting United.