ANDY Payton could return to the squad to take on fellow play-off chasers Ipswich Town tomorrow.

The Clarets striker has only had 14 mintues of first team action this season, when he replaced Alan Moore in the 77th minute of their 1-0 defeat at home to Sheffield United in August.

He has since recovered from a hernia operation and returned to training in preparation for tomorrow's game against Joe Royle's men at Turf Moor.

But Burnley manager Stan Ternent did not want to tempt fate by naming Payton, who needs 19 more goals to reach a century of strikes for the Clarets, in his squad to face Town.

"He's been out training so he may be on the line,"Ternent said. "So we'll see if there is any reaction.

"If you ask me at the moment if he'll play I'd say 'no'. If you ask Andy he might say 'yes', but who knows what can happen.

"But certainly if he's fit then he'll be in the squad, that's for sure."

The Clarets, who have Gareth Taylor, Dean West and Ian Cox suspended this afternoon, were hit by more injury problems this week after midfielder Paul Weller bowed out of last week's trip to Grimsby early after pulling up with a calf strain, while Brad Maylett suffered a recurrence of his Achilles problem.

Ternent summed up his side's current injury and suspension lists in one word ... "Horrendous!"

He added: "I've got more in the dressing room than I have on the pitch. It has to be sorted out and I'll sort it out at 12 o'clock or even two o'clock on Saturday, whatever it takes."

But he said the squad was pulling together at a difficult time.

"If you're happy at your work then you always seem to do better and I try to encourage that at the club," he said.

Despite a growing list of visitors to physio Ian Liversedge's treatment room, Ternent was looking forward to tomorrow's game and meeting up with his friend, Joe Royle, who has turned Town's season around since taking over from George Burley in October last year.

"They will pick up under Joe Royle and they've got some very good players. So we'll have a good match, it will be a good game of football and if we have ambitions to get into that top half dozen, or going on that way, then it's a match we need to win or certainly not lose. But Ipswich have similar aspirations to ourselves," Ternent said.

"They're in a similar situation to most Football League clubs. They had to sell a player to Birmingham and (Hermann) Hreidarsson was the subject of an offer from a club earlier in the season. In an ideal world you'd like to keep your good players, butinjuries, suspensions and selling your best players plays a big part in where you're going to finish.

"They play open good attractive football, they are very competitive and they have very good players with high degrees of skill."

He added: "With Joe in charge and the quality of players they have it would seem reasonable to think that perhaps they could achieve them.

"Joe's extremely successful football manager, but above all that he's a fantastic human being. He's a really good guy."

Ternent was still looking to bring a loan player in during the January transfer window but said the club's link with Sunderland mdfielder Sean Thornton was just speculation.

He added that the club would like to extend goalkeeper Marlon Beresford's contract but said a month to month deal was the best for both parties at the moment.