Former Burnley boss Steve Cotterill on the one Wembley hero that got away

There was another on the bench, and two in the 16-man matchday squad came through the ranks under the former Clarets boss.

And Cotterill had also lined up one of the heroes of the semi-final second leg at Reading - striker Martin Paterson - but had been unable to afford him before he parted ways with the club in November 2007.

Of the side who started at Wembley, he had signed Graham Alexander, Steven Caldwell, Michael Duff, Clarke Carlisle, Wade Elliott and Robbie Blake, with Joey Gudjonsson on the bench.

Chris McCann also started, with Jay Rodriguez a substitute - both who emerged from the youth ranks during Cotterill's tenure.

Another signing, Stephen Jordan, not in the 16 at Wembley, also played a big part in the side's success that season.

But missing out on Paterson, who eventually was brought in by Owen Coyle in the summer of 2008, was a big regret.

Cotterill said: "Eight of the players I took to the club helped win promotion in 2009, and the other one would have been Martin Paterson, but I couldn't afford Pato.

"He was £1.6m or something like that.

"Towards the end of my time there, we'd had a bid for Kyle Lafferty from Fulham, they came in at £3m, then £4m, and it got to £5m.

"I then suggested to Brendan Flood we should sell him, but they didn't want to, and lo and behold they ended up selling him for less that summer, which was strange.

"For £5m, I'd have replaced a couple of players.

"Martin Paterson was already on the list, and one other, and we could have got both for £3m and had £2m in the bank.

"If that had been down to myself and Barry (Kilby), I think we'd have probably done that."

While so many of his players went on to play in the Premier League in 2009/10, one of his earliest signings was already establishing himself at that level.

He swooped for Gary Cahill on loan from Aston Villa in November 2004, and insisted the centre back, then 18, would go on and play for England.

That he did, earning 61 caps, going to every major tournament between 2012 and 2018, starting every game at the World Cup in Brazil in 2014, and at Euro 2016.

Cotterill had pencilled in Cahill as a target before he was appointed Burnley boss, and explained: "At the time, Villa had a really strong squad, and he didn't always get a game in their reserves, he was really young, 17, but he didn't always get a game for the reserves.

"I remember us knocking Villa out of the League Cup, when Jean Louis Valois, people like that were playing - we beat them 3-1 at Turf Moor.

"David O'Leary let me have Gary. I spoke to him after the game and he was really good.

"Over the years I stayed in contact with Gary with the odd text, when he's won the Premier League or played for England or whatever, it's been good.

"But Gary was one who went down well for us.

"It was really nice to give someone like that his debut, but think there's a lot of credit goes to himself, but John McGreal alongside him.

"I think John brought him on as well.

"You wouldn't want to claim setting Gary off on his career, because he was going to be a player anyway, but Gary also had John alongside him.

"John was a good talker, and the experience of him and Frank Sinclair really helped Gary.

"We had a young one in Gary and Michael Duff, experience in John and Frank, so we made some astute signings with very little money.

"We had to be spot on with everything we did, we worked hard, myself, Dave Kevan, Steve Davis joined us late on, Cliff Roberts, so there was always plenty going on, and some good signings."

Duff was a young one, famously a "calculated risk", signed for £30,000 from former club Cheltenham in the summer of 2004.

Duff would win promotion to the Premier League three times with Burnley in 12 years as a player at Turf Moor, before moving on to the coaching side, and then returning to Cheltenham as manager in September 2018.

He had guided the Robins to the brink of promotion from League 2 before the shutdown, and he goes down as one of Cotterill's best pieces of business: "He cost £30,000 but we had nothing then, there was very little change rolling around.

"Barry trusted me, I would say 'I've got this', he would say 'where do you see him playing?'

"I said Michael will always end up as a centre back, but early on when I had John McGreal, Frankie, Gary Cahill, Duffo had to play right back.

"But it was no different to when he first got into the team at 16 at Cheltenham.

"He was released by Swindon when he was 15 because he was only 5ft 6!

"He had a huge growth spurt that took him to 6ft 3, but he wasn't the biggest built.

"I just felt that bit of bulk would come on him when he got older, and that's when he ended up playing centre back.

"Did I see him as management material? I don't know if I did until later in his career.

"He would always ask questions as a kid, and he would always soak up information.

"You didn't have to keep telling him.

"He played a lot of big games when he was quite young, and had those experiences.

"I think he was always going to go into coaching. The management job was always going to be a decision for him, once he started coaching.

"Now he's gone to being a manager, I think he would find it incredibly hard to go back to being a coach again.

"So he'd better carry on doing well, he's done great."