Manager Sean Dyche has said Burnley’s transfer policy won’t change should we secure European football for the coming campaign.
With Burnley battling with Arsenal for sixth place, but a seventh-place entry into the Europa League still an option for the Clarets in 2018/19, our gaffer has said that he doesn’t envisage a change to our approach to the summer transfer window.
With Europe potentially offering the club an additional revenue stream, Dyche told Sky Sports that there wouldn’t be a major change, we would continue looking for quality at the right price that we could then improve.
“It’s hard for us to buy ‘the one’ who can walk straight into our team. We have to look at a high level of development player – not necessarily someone for £100,000 to turn into a world beater – but the kind of market for us is a few million quid.”
With Burnley having spent more than £10million on only four occasions but continually having success when it comes to bargains like Nick Pope and James Tarkowski – now England candidates obviously – that will be the route we continue to take.
“We can’t jump to £25m for people, five times over, we’ve got to look not just for the next six months but the six months after that, 18 months, 24 months, and that is tough. But you have to keep looking and future proofing, getting the players in we think we can mould for the future. Some of the ones we bought in the past, people said ‘why are they bringing them in?’ and they’re the ones who are now coming of age.”
As the saying goes, don’t try and fix something when it’s not broken.
Burnley’s transfer approach over the last number of years has worked out for us. We are in the position where, for the right player, we can push the boat financially a touch but with the groundwork in place, we are covered if the signing doesn’t work out as we hope.
Change that and push the boat too far and we could quickly find ourselves in trouble.
Whilst our existing system of developing players works, we should stick with it and continue looking for those players that we believe we can improve and take to the next level and we either see the benefit of that work in the first team or we see the benefit of that work on the balance sheet.