Who will be the US Club to Partner?

The US Tour of America is over and we will leave the comments to Owen Coyle on how successful the trip has been:

'There are so many positives to take, we had a lot of youth out on the pitch and two young players scored, plus Martin Paterson was outstanding too.

"It`s been a very worthwhile exercise and we are looking stronger in terms of fitness. We`ve made lots of new friends in Carolina and Minnesota and have forged some good relationships.

"Hopefully if we get a couple of young players on the back of that then fantastic. We have brought the name of Burnley Football Club to America now.

"We`re very pleased with that and the lads have been an absolute credit to Burnley Football Club. Everybody we have spoken to over here has nothing but praise for how the players have conducted themselves and represented the football club."

The Clarets shortlisted three USL clubs with a view to seeking a partnership similar to that at Stoke City with Austin Aztex. The clubs were:

Carolina Railhawks
Minnesota Thunder
Richmond Kickers

All three clubs were visited by senior management in June this year.Burnley chairman Barry Kilby, Operational Director Brendan Flood and Development Director Paul Fletcher together with Assistant Manager Sandy Stewart visited the USA to try and build relationships with US clubs with a view to developing young talent on both sides of the Atlantic.The eventual set-up will hopefully lead to summer training camps in the USA with a view to scouting for local talent and exchanging players between the two clubs.

We have also recently of course played two exhibition friendly matches on our US tour against Cary U-23 in North Carolina and the Thunder in Minnesota.

The club were based mainly at Cary's WakeMed facility during the eight day visit, training using their state of the art facilities. They did however also spend a couple of days at the National Sports Center in Blaine, Minnesota and are aware of Thunder's intention to start a youth academy and their facilities.

We can give you a flavour as to where the club are on this issue at the moment via a short audio interview with Darren Bentley given to BlueSkySoccer.com's Brian Quarstad. Blu Sky Soccer.com is the Minnesota Thunder Soccer Fansite.

You can find this by going to the following link and selecting the Darren Bentley Interview (You might also like to listen to an Owen Coyle interview plus a interview with Clarets fanatic,Jonathan Barren on different topics)

Darren Bentley Interview Link

I suppose Carolina may have the edge over Minnesota purely based on time spent there, with Richmond Kickers now less likely. On the other hand,although unlikely the club might go for somebody totally different.

What do you think? Why not vote in our Poll on the front page and discuss your thoughts in our Mayhem US forum?

Click here to join in the debate on the club forum.