Burnley boss Vincent Kompany on the trials and tribulations he's faced on the way to winning Premier League promotion

From having to make hard decisions in allowing key players to leave on his arrival, to selling the club and his vision during negotiations with transfer targets, the Burnley boss has been put through the mire.

England international goalkeeper Nick Pope's move to Newcastle United was ratified just hours before the Manchester City legend had been confirmed as Sean Dyche's successor at Turf Moor while out-of-contract duo Ben Mee and James Tarkowski were already on the lookout for opportunities elsewhere.

It had also become apparent that the likes of Nathan Collins, Dwight McNeil and Maxwel Cornet would need to be moved on to finance the necessary rebuild that could give them a fighting chance in the Championship.

He said: “What you think in the beginning, I don’t know. I remember the first game of the season, we’ve got Dwight McNeil and Maxwel Cornet in the building, I wouldn’t have minded to play them against Huddersfield, but we knew what we had to do.

“There was things that were hard, there were decisions that we had to make that were hard to do, but that were the only reasonable decisions in order to restock and replenish the talent pool in the club and then it’s sometimes a leap of faith. But we just worked hard.".

The trio made big-money moves to Wolves, Everton and West Ham United respectively, though McNeil and Cornet were still in the building when the Clarets faced Huddersfield Town at the John Smith's Stadium on the opening day of the season.

In the end, as the season's first transfer window passed, Burnley were unrecognisable, with around 11 recognised seniors departing, including Aaron Lennon, Matej Vydra, Phil Bardsley, Erik Pieters and Dale Stephens, while 16 players came the other way.

Reflecting on that baptism of fire, following his appointment from Anderlecht in mid-June, the ex-Belgium defender said: “There are two ways to look at it - one is it’s daunting, it’s difficult and how are we going to do it.

"The second is the way we look at it and it’s filled with opportunities; what if we do this, what if we manage to convince this player?

“It took us days, weeks even, to convince some of the players who are here today, but eventually you get them in the building.

"Then some of them end up being better than you thought they were. Some of them have still not achieved their ceiling and that’s the exciting part about it as well.”

The Premier League Hall of Fame inductee may well have it all to do again this summer as Burnley prepare for their ninth season in the Premier League in the last 15 years.

Reports of the club's financial issues after relegation were widespread, with a significant proportion of a £65m loan, taken out as part of the club's takeover by ALK Capital in December 2020, needing to be repaid.

The Clarets were then hit with a transfer embargo by the EFL last month following the late submission of their accounts, which was put down to a change in auditor.

However, Kompany doesn't believe there'll be anything standing in the way of the club going about their business in the summer. He said: “No, it’s something I’ve said before, but we’ve remedied the problems last summer already. We went down, there was a loan to repay, we paid it with the parachute money.

“Then we sold players for whatever amount of money, which I’m not allowed to disclose, but a lot. We used a part of that money, not all of it, to buy all of the players you’ve seen today.

"These players now are a little bit more valuable than they were when they came through the door, and that’s how we are healthy and ready to go next season in the Premier League.”