THE Burnley board have met with the mystery takeover bidder.

The businessman - based abroad - is one of three parties interested in buying the club.

Chairman Frank Teasdale and other board members held talks last week with the millionaire, who has business interests in North America and Europe.

And the board hope to arrange a meeting with tycoon Ray Ingleby's representative, David Parry, for this week.

He has just returned from a two-week business trip to Australia on behalf of Ingleby.

I understand that Ingleby himself will not play a direct role in further detailed discussions with the board.

The board are also attempting to take a third bid, from a Manchester consortium backed by Apax Partners, a stage further although little progress has been made on that front.

The need for action gathered further momentum with another disappointing 1-0 defeat for Chris Waddle's side at Bristol Rovers.

Midfield man Mark Ford was sent off in the first half for "serious foul play". New signing Andy Payton made a promising start without luck, hitting the post on one occasion.

Waddle did not attend the usual post-match press conference and was today unavailable for comment.

But midfield partner Damien Matthew felt referee Robert Styles should have shown more common sense.

He said: "The referee knew of Mark and maybe Mark has to learn that, coming from the Premiership and being a David Batty type of player, he is perhaps looked on differently.

"He had already been booked so he knew he couldn't do anything too rash.

"It was a bookable offence but it was on the half-way line and they were not going to break and score so, in the context of the game, common sense should have prevailed."

Ford will miss just one game because the dismissal was for two yellow cards.

The suspension means he will miss the game with York at Turf Moor on January 31.

Matthew added: "It was typical of the way games are going.

"We had a good start and if Andy Payton had scored in the first few minutes then confidence would have been up and we would have been flying."

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