BURNLEY boss Stan Ternent is ready to bide his time in the transfer market ready to launch an assault at promotion next season.

The Clarets are on target to achieve their primary aim of staying in Division One.

And once that's assured Ternent will look to spend safe in the knowledge that the cash will be in place next term.

Staying up will guarantee Burnley some £2.4 million from television revenues alone.

And Ternent looks ready to keep faith with his current squad until that money is as good as in the bank.

He said: "My idea is that I'm preparing for a First Division campaign, certainly next season.

"That hasn't been achieved yet so it would be foolish to go out and pay First Division wages when we're not (certain of being) in the First Division.

"I've done it with Ian Moore and he looks a player and has improved the side and once we've achieved First Division status I will speak to the board and look at the situation.

"They have said that there is money available but I won't squander it."

That's not to say that Ternent wouldn't buy the right player in the shorter term if any of his long-standing targets, such as Birmingham's Dele Adebola, was suddently made available.

And as he as has said before, if the opportunity of promotion this time around somehow presented it he would look to grasp it.

But it appears that no-one will be bought in just to try and lift Burnley up the table a couple of places.

"Not unless he strengthens the team and the club for the foreseeable future. A quick-fix isn't needed," said Ternent, who believes his players have done well to claim ninth place in the table on the back of last season's promotion.

"With the financial implications of things we have to walk before we can run.

"The chairman and the board have worked wonders. I've spent a million pounds and while I've sold one or two that was for nothing like a million so we are making progress," he added.

Ternent will also assess new deals for his current playing staff once the Clarets have guaranteed their safety, as he did last season when delaying new contract offers for the likes of Mitchell Thomas and Paul Cook until he knows what division the club would be playing in.

"Just because they're out of contract and I haven't offered one doesn't mean I won't. I have to see if we maintain our status and then I'll get a budget and do a two-year plan," he said.

Ternent has to balance supporters' aspirations with hard-headed realism and despite the Clarets' excellent start to the season hasn't deviated from his original aim.

"I understand their expectation levels but Rome wasn't built in a day.

"Maintaining a First Division status has got to be progress. We started off very well and got 38 points from 20 games and we are now on 42 with 19 games still to go so there are a lot of points to play for.

"It's a season of consolidation and it was always meant to be that," said the boss, who was disappointed with Tuesday night's FA Cup defeat at Scunthorpe and the reaction of the supporters to Andy Payton's substitution but clearly isn't going anywhere else.