Coyle continues to be linked

I think most of us remember Coyle from the Bolton squad that also included strikers such as Mixu Paatelainen, Fabian DeFreitas and of course John McGinlay the man oft recalled from our 1994 home game against Bolton.

Coyle returned to his native Scotland after leaving Wanderers in 1995 and continued to play in the Scottish leagues until last season. He had a spell as player/manager at Falkirk and then took up a similar position with St. Johnstone.

He's brought them close to a promotion to the SPL, and also engineered their Scottish Cup run to the semi-final last season which ended with a 2-1 defeat against Celtic at Hampden Park.

He was tipped to move to Motherwell in the summer to replace Mauric Malpas but instead signed an extended deal with St. Johnstone until 2010. It is being suggested north of the border that the Clarets could be set to request permission to speak to Coyle.

Three and a half years ago, as we searched for a replacement for Stan Ternent, there was also a manager from the Scottish League very much in the running. On that occasion it was John Robertson, at the time manager of Inverness Caledonian Thistle. Nothing came of it and Robertson eventually moved on to Hearts and then Ross County before taking his current position as manager of Livingston in February 2006.