No loans for Burnley

Steve said this week: "I tried to get two loans, but the players didn't want to come to us and have now moved to other clubs in the Championship on loan. That was that really. We can't bring those two in and they would have made us stronger. I wouldn't bring in anybody just for numbers, we have enough numbers, but their quality would have been helpful.

"There's nothing else better than we can have at this moment in time. We've looked everywhere else, but there's nothing else we can get that's better or affordable. The money that is being paid out in his league is astronomical, it has kicked on another base from last year."

Those comments led to speculation as to who the two players might be and it is surely more than an educated guess to come up with Phil Bardsley, who moved this week from Manchester United to Sheffield United, and Andrew Davies who a week earlier joined Southampton from Middlesbrough.

Bardsley played with us on loan in the latter stages of the 2005/06 season and it was believed that Steve Cotterill tried to bring him in during August before making a move for Graham Alexander.

As for Davies, the nationals linked us with a loan move for him last January and again there was a strong suggestion that we'd made a big offer for him during the summer to take him from Middlesbrough in a permanent move.

Neither of them are coming, and for now the Clarets will be continuing with the squad that Steve Cotterill currently as at his disposal.