FORMER Clarets player, coach and caretaker boss Steve Davis believes making Turf Moor a fortress will once again be key for Burnley next season.

Burnley won 10 Premier League matches in front of their own fans last season with their 33 point haul at Turf Moor almost enough to secure survival in its own right.

A strong home record has been a regular occurrence for the Clarets under boss Sean Dyche and it was also something that Davis enjoyed during a career at the club that spanned 396 games as well as half a decade on the coaching staff, including a one-game spell in temporary charge in 2007.

With Davis as first-team coach the Clarets started strongly at home in their Premier League campaign of 2009/10, winning their first four games at Turf Moor, and the former centre back believes home form can be the cornerstone of success in the top flight.

“That season we were in the Premier League (in 2009/10) the home form got us into 14th position when we left,” he said. “The home form we had even back in 1991/92 and even 1994 when we won the play-off final (was good), it was the home form that was key.

“It’s massive for any club, but particularly if you’re in the Premier League, if you can make your home a fortress, which Turf Moor is, it’s huge.”

Burnley took pride last year in making Turf Moor an intimidating place to come for visiting sides and they will seek to do the same during the 2017/18 season.

“It’s a great ground when it’s full and the crowd are at it, making a noise. It’s a difficult place to come,” said Davis.

“When those players walk up that corridor into the dressing room it was always blowing a gale and cold and visiting players are thinking ‘oh no, what have we come to here?’.

“It’s an intimidating place without being a big 40,000-plus stadium. Sometimes these players don’t get the home comforts they expect in the Premier League in that small away dressing room, especially when they turn the heaters up in there and ramp it up into a sauna.

“The home form is fantastic and hopefully it will be the same again next year with hopefully a few away wins in the mix as well will keep them safe again.”

Davis, now chief scout at Fleetwood, is delighted to see the Clarets, a club that remains close to his heart, thriving under Dyche as they look forward to a second successive campaign in the top flight for the first time in 42 years.

“To go up, come down, go up, come down again and then go up and stay up is a fantastic achievement,” he said.

“Sean and his staff and the players have done fantastically well. With the infrastructure off the pitch and the training ground having just been completed, it’s now a proper Premier League club and if they can stay up this year and give Sean a bit of money to spend to improve the squad which you have to do year in and year out, hopefully they can become a Stoke, a regular Premier League club and stay in there.

“It’s well documented the riches that come with that. But Sean will tell you better than I can that it’s no easy feat to stay in that league.

“I’m delighted they are where they are.”