New board have to back Sean Dyche - former Burnley midfielder Paul Weller

But former Burnley midfielder Paul Weller feels it is a big summer for the club’s new owners – to sort a new deal for the manager, and back him in the transfer market.

Weller, on the club’s books from 1991 to 2004, still lives locally and follows Burnley’s fortunes as a summariser for Radio Lancashire.

And, speaking ahead of the launch of his book, ‘Not Such A Bad Life – Burnley, Gazza, Wrighty, Waddle and Me’, Weller looked at the state of play at his old club.

He feels Burnley will stay up now, currently sitting seven points clear of Fulham in 18th, with nine games to play.

And the hard work starts again.

Dyche has a year remaining on his current contract, and recently said: “We are fine at the minute, we are just getting on with sorting the bigger picture out, with Alan Pace getting used to what the club is, and some of the other guys who are involved getting a handle on that side of things. I think that is more important at the moment, the welfare of the club.”

But Weller said: “They’ll be safe now, definitely.

“The big thing now is what’s going to happen in the summer. Is this new ownership going to let him spend money, or the money that maybe brings in for Tarky (James Tarkowski), or whoever may go?

“It’s a big summer – the squad is a little bit threadbare, and they’re not getting any younger, some of those players.

“Burnley need the manager on a new contract as well, and I think Sean needs it as well.

“I think he’s Burnley for life. I can see him being there for quite a long time yet – I still don’t see him anywhere else.

“With respect, who wants the brand created at Burnley? It works for them, and worked for Stoke until they tried to change it.

“I’m not sure if the mindset of how they play works for anyone else in that league, especially above Burnley.

“You could go into the Championship and make them solid and bring them up, but why would he want to do that? He’s got a great set of fans that love him to bits, he’s just got to hope that the chairman and board give him the funds to keep it fresh.”

“You’ve got to freshen that squad up, it gets stale if you don’t.

“New blood needs to come through, there have to be young lads coming through.”

Weller does wonder, however, whether Dyche needs to slightly tweak his way of playing, to see more of the sort of performance that his players produced in winning 2-1 at Everton: “I think a lot of fans are starting to edge towards wanting more attractive football - with lockdown, they’ve now seen a lot of the games, those that might not go away, and I’ve heard people saying they’d like to see a bit more quality.

”I think you have to start to introduce flair, but flair that has the quality to defend and play within a structure, not just a free spirit.

”Those players are out there, that will sit within a system and do the defensive side, but it’s finding them, and you will have to pay.

”Burnley need to bring one or two of that type, not massive surgery, like a Brady at the time, at £13m...it’s a bit of a gamble, but he did okay early on before his injury.

”They’ve found the right ones before, look at Pope and Gudmundsson, players like that.”