TOM Heaton admitted it was hard to explain why Burnley had, for the second time this season, set a new record for length of time without a top flight goal.

Another blank against West Ham took the Clarets to 569 minutes without scoring - four additional minutes to the mark set at Leicester City in October.

Burnley have scored just once in nine games, and not at all in the last six.

The last time they found the net was George Boyd’s 61st minute winner against Manchester City in March.

But Heaton said that, while the statistic was a source of frustration, it was not for the want of trying to end their drought.

“It’s difficult,” said Heaton. “The defences are very good but we’re certainly getting into the positions up in the field. It’s then that little final bit of composure, whether it’s a pass or seeing someone.

“But there’s certainly no shortage of endeavour and we’ll keep trying to look to rectify it and that starts again this week.”

Danny Ings went close with a first-half header from Matt Taylor’s cross and Ashley Barnes’ had a header kept out by Adrian, who went on to save well from Taylor in the second half.

Heaton said the quality of defences had made chances harder to come by, making missed opportunities harder to take.

“Teams never get flustered whether they’re winning, losing or drawing. That’s certainly something I’ve seen this year,” he said.

“Pretty much every team you come up against is comfortable defending.

“We’ve unlocked the door plenty of times this season, albeit not too much recently.

“We need to look back and gain confidence from the goals we’ve scored and keep going.”

Of his saves, notably from Enner Valencia and Amalfitano soon after Noble had beaten him from the spot, he said: “You try to stay in the game for as long as you can, especially at 1-0 whether you’ve got 11 men or 10 but even more importantly at 10.

“Our thought process was to try to stay in the game as long as you can, you never know when something lands for you.

“Unfortunately it didn’t do. Even though we managed to rally the troops and contain them.

“It’s always going to be difficult after getting a man sent off 25 minutes into a game.

“The penalty was probably fair but the sending off I thought was very harsh.

“You’re up against it after that. It’s tough, but I thought we rallied really well.

“We contained them, we balanced it with a bit of offensive play and a few half chances.

“I thought we did well but unfortunately we’ve come up short.

“We’ve got three games left and we want to focus on going to Hull next and giving a good account of ourselves.

“We’ll keep fighting.”