Eddie Howe has just completed his first season in charge at Turf Moor since joining from Bournemouth in January. In the first of a three-part series, we look back at how the Burnley boss made the most of a playing career cut short by injury at the age of just 29 years old to become one of the most sought-after young managers in the country.

FOR camera-shy Eddie Howe, having his emotions laid bare before the Sky Sports crew was not how he’d imagined his Bournemouth days coming to an end.

But after his last game in charge, he couldn’t hide them, regardless of the live broadcast.

He was cherished by the Cherries, but after bringing them back from the brink of relegation from the Football League to promotion to League One, it was time to go – although not immediately.

He had unfinished business. He had prepared the players for a Friday night game at Colchester and he had to see it through.

Addressing the Sky interviewer on bowing out with a 2-1 defeat, Howe was sombre but well-spoken, and as honest as he could be at the time with his Turf Moor contract still to be finalised.

Privately, though, he had said his goodbyes.

“The reason I decided to stay on and manage the team for the Colchester game was because I didn’t want to leave Bournemouth high and dry with a few hours to go before a match,” Howe explained.

“I spoke to the players and felt it was the right thing to do.

“It was the worst game possible to be televised live on Sky from a personal point of view because it was so emotional. In hindsight, although the result didn’t go our way, I’m glad I did what I did.”

And there were words of encouragement from opposition manager John Ward, who had a season at Turf Moor as Adrian Heath’s assistant in 1996/97.

“He said some very positive things about the club and said I’d given a fantastic opportunity and wished me good luck,” Howe continued.

“I find him to be a really good man and I appreciated his words.

“It was a surreal night because I just packed a bag and I was off.

“One minute I was in Colchester, the next I was in Burnley.

“It was a strange 24 hours.

“To have the crowd singing my name at Turf Moor ... it didn’t seem as if they were singing about me, if that makes sense.

“I was pleased just to get to work and start afresh.”

Plenty of thought processes had gone into his big move.

He had previously turned down Southampton and Peterborough, and in the days before joining the Clarets he was reported to have decided against filling the vacant managerial positions at Crystal Palace and Charlton Athletic.

Rejecting those advances prompted scenes of celebration outside Bournemouth’s Dean Court, with Cherries chairman Eddie Mitchell declaring Howe was staying put.

But little did they know what was round the corner, as Burnley built up to make their move.

The Clarets’ offer ultimately proved too good to turn down, even to someone who had spent half of his life at his boyhood club.

“I look back at that upset as really unfortunate. The timing of events was unfortunate. I definitely didn’t set out to deceive people or lie to anybody. There was no need to.

“It was the last thing I wanted to do because I had such fantastic times there.

“If I ever wanted to leave I wanted to do it in the right way. But then there’s probably never a good way.

“When you’re successful at a club and people don’t want you to go there isn’t going to be a good time to leave.”

The emotional pull made it all the more heart-wrenching.

The Amersham-born blond was 11-years-old when he moved south west with his family and close to the seaside resort – growing up in nearby Verwood.

An avid football fan, Howe immediately latched onto his local team, progressing from the terraces, to the first team and then the dugout in just 20 years. Fans took to the central defender straight away. He was voted man of the match when he made his debut in a 2-0 win over Hull City at Dean Court, while still only a second year apprentice and captain of the youth team.

“I wasn’t expecting to start because we had worked on shape during the week and I wasn’t in the team. I knew I was close to the squad but hadn’t even sat on the bench,” he recalled.

“I turned up at the ground and thought I would be watching the game from the stand. When Mel Machin read out the starting line-up, it was a big surprise to find out I was in it.

“I remember having a couple of good early touches in the game.

“That always helps and having the crowd on my side was another big boost for me. It was a good game and a great result.

"I have always been my own harshest critic but felt I did okay that day.

"I was just delighted to have made an appearance.” It was to be the first of many.

Howe was 13th in the list of the club’s all-time league appearance makers, with 270, when a persistent knee injury cut his playing career cruelly short at 29 and accelerated his route into management.

He made the best of a bad situation, learning his ropes through the reserves and the Centre of Excellence before succeeding Jimmy Quinn in January 2009, and he was proud to be given the opportunity to manage his hometown team.

“I just loved football and Bourne-mouth were my local team so I was on the terraces and I got the bug for it,” he said.

“I used to watch them home and away. I didn’t travel every week, but I did when I could.

“I would never have believed I’d go on to manage them one day.”

Two years after taking charge of the Cherries, he became a Claret, and he hasn’t looked back.

“It was a big step because I’d been at Bournemouth a long time and leaving was never going to be easy,” he said.

“It’s a very different environment. You don’t know how things are going to be or how people are going to react. There are a lot of unknowns.

“But I don’t regret the decision I made.

“In life you get given choices every day and you have to make decisions.

“I can look back and know I made the decision for the right reasons, and I’m pleased I did it, purely from a career point of view.

“I feel I’ve come to a fantastic club, an ambitious club with really good people, exceptional supporters and a really good squad.”