Madden set to return

The 20-year-old trained with the club, although he was unable to figure in Monday’s reserve team game, with the coaching staff eager to have a closer look at the Dubliner.

Celtic have also monitored his proegress, and reportedly made two offers for him, although the player was unable to agree personal terms with the SPL giants.

Bohs are looking to cash in to help with debts, and an initial fee of £100,000 has been mooted.

Boss Brian Laws said: “We tried to keep it quiet, but I think Bohemians are in desperate need of funding and he’s certainly their best prospect of generating some cash.

“He’s a player that has been talked about for some time, and we had him here for a few days.

“It’s difficult to judge a guy in training, because we can’t play him in a game through the legalities of it all - we weren’t allowed to play him in the reserves on Monday like we wanted, but he’s gone back and we’ll invite him back in January and hopefully by that time we might be able to get him in a game.

“But he’s a young player, one that has a future ahead of him. Is he ready yet? I’m not so sure.

“He got a long way to go before you can talk of him being the next Kevin Doyle, but I can understand it, Bohemians are desperately in need of cash and trying to generate as much as possible.”

l BURNLEY’S youngsters missed out on the chance of facing Newcastle United at St James’ Park after crashing out of the FA Youth Cup at the first hurdle against Grimsby Town on Wednesday night.

The Clarets were given a proverbial mountain to climb when Dayule Southwell struck just shy of the half hour mark, before Sam Mulready doubled the hosts’ advantage with a header seven minutes before the interval, giving Town a 2-0 half-time lead.

Captain Dave Lynch halved the deficit early in the second half but a Curtis Woods own goal restored the home side’s two-goal advantage as he sliced an attempted clearance past Josh Cook.

The Clarets hit back again to give themselves a fighting chance when Joe Jackson struck from the edge of the box to make it 3-2 with 35 minutes still remaining.

The goal prompted Pashley to switch to a more attacking formation but despite the Clarets dominating the final exchanges, with substitute Mehdi Lazaar and Shay McCartan forcing Grimsby keeper Rob Peet into making reflex saves, they failed to force an equaliser.