Burnley figure provides fascinating insight into pre-season preparations ahead of Premier League return

That’s according to the Clarets’ director of performance Damian Roden, who has provided a fascinating insight into what work Scott Parker’s side are doing this summer in readiness for their top flight return.

While there’s an obvious step-up in quality in moving through the top two divisions, the biggest chasm comes in the physical data.

Roden also explained how Burnley will look to remain tactically adaptable at all times this coming season, depending on the opponent.

“We are preparing this season similar in principle to how we prepared last year - to be a hard-working, high intensity, dynamic team,” he told the club’s official website.

“The difference lies in the gulf physically between the Premier League and the Championship. We were pretty much top of the physical stats last season in the Championship, but when you look at those statistics compared to the Premier League statistics, we wouldn’t be anywhere near the top.

“In recognising that the boss is preparing the team to be able to improve in those areas and the training mirrors the highest distance per minute, the highest high speed per minute and the highest sprint distance per minute that the players will face in a Premier League game to prime them for exactly that.

“The boss and Jono [Jonathan Hill, assistant] are very diligent with statistics and how to tweak things slightly to get the desired intensity, develop and progress it, to lead into the season and to try and compete and even dominate physically.

“The tactical side of things are fairly similar too albeit being mindful that eight of nine teams that have gone up in the last three years have come back down.

“There are a couple of styles of play that the boss is working with the players on to ensure the team are not naïve, are adaptable, and resilient, robust and ultimately successful.”

Following their automatic promotion from the Championship, the Clarets were given a slightly longer break than usual - around eight weeks.

Having returned at the end of June, Burnley are now about to complete their third week of pre-season.

Roden explained: “We got promoted from the Championship, so we finished earlier than we would in the Premier League. Therefore, we had a couple of extra weeks off.

“It was important the players understood after a long, hard season, the priority was rest and recovery, both from a physical but also a mental perspective.

“We told them to just relax and forget football for two to three weeks - still do things to keep active such as swimming and cycling but to just switch off and allow your body and mind to reset.

“We knew what the pre-season training schedule looked like from day one, so the players were built up over five weeks leading into that, albeit very, very light to start off with. But the volume and intensity increased towards the start. If they follow that they’ll be able to start at where the manager wants to start pre-season.

“We had an app where they had recommendations of what to eat and what to avoid to make sure they came back at a similar body fat and body weight. They had a strength programme with videos of exercises, sets and reps that they needed to follow and on what days. The same with running exercises.

“If they followed that it’d just be a home from home if you like, priming them for the type of work they would be doing, gradually progressing each week of the programme throughout the summer so we knew where to start in every aspect.”

Parker’s side are currently out in the Algarve, in Portugal, for a week-long warm-weather training camp.

Outlining the benefits of such a camp, Roden added: “When you go away, you can spend more time working on every aspect of a player’s game without distractions.

“You can control what time the players wake up, control the food they have, the training content, and the facilities that you have at your disposal at this level have often got a state of the art recovery suite, pools, all the things that will enhance performance and recovery at a time you want them to be physically overloaded.

“Training in the heat places an excessive load on top of the load that’s being placed on the body from the training exposure, but the adaptation you get from it is high.

“It’s like having a training session and half a training session again, so your body has to work harder to combat the heat while maintaining a high physical output.

“If you get it right and allow for recovery at the right times, then you’re going to come back in a fitter state than you possibly would do if you were just in a normal environment.”

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