Last year the club enjoyed part of pre-season in Carolina, forging links with the Premier Development team in Cary, now renamed the Cary Clarets.

And Brendan Flood, who, with Paul Fletcher looked at Ventura back in February, admitted: "We think there's some real talent here in the US.
"We know that that talent gets diluted by other sports. But we want to give it a route to European soccer.

"You see the increase of US players coming into the (British) game, so probably other people have the same idea."

And the Operational Director feels the move could lead to Burnley mining a rich vein of players across the country: "We feel like we'd like to franchise ourselves in the East Coast and West Coast and try and work more long term to source players here.

"In due time, we'd expect two or three players a year to be coming into the senior squad in Burnley from US links.

"We're certainly building a good relationship with (general manager) Ranbir (Shergill) and coach Graham Smith with the Fusion. We'd like that to sort of go further, toward a franchise."

The Fusion have already seen one player depart for the Premier League, with midfielder Anton Peterlin joining Everton after impressing on trial.

And Shergill is eager to develop the friendship with Burnley further: "It's something that we've spoken about and it's something that we'll continue to speak about.

"Burnley have had a great time here. We're looking to expand our relationship with them."