STEVE Cotterill has put his search for new signings on hold after seeing his two main loan targets join rival Champ-ionship clubs.

The Burnley boss had hoped to strengthen his squad after both Besart Berisha and Michael Duff were ruled out for the rest of the season with cruciate knee ligament injuries.

Cotterill had outlined midfield and right back as the two key areas, but, after missing out on the unnamed duo, he admitted he would not be turning his attentions elsewhere at the moment.

Instead, he sees the situation as an opportunity for the likes of John Spicer and Alan Mahon to cement their places in the starting line-up.

"We tried to get two loans, but they didn't want to come to us and have moved to other clubs in the Championship," the Clarets boss said.

"That was that really. We can't bring those two in.

"They would have been good ones to bring in because they would have made us stronger, but I wouldn't bring anybody in just for numbers, we have enough numbers, but their quality would have been helpful.

"There's nothing else better that we can have at this moment in time.

"We've looked everywhere, but there's nothing else we can get that's better or affordable.

"The money that is being paid out in this league is absolutely astronomical, it's kicked on another base from last year.

"But still, we've got some good lads that I know will go out and they'll give their all, whereas sometimes if you get somebody else in, if they're not better than what you've got first of all they're not going to improve you and secondly are they going to be as committed as the players you've already got.

"And there's been the re-emergence of people like John Spicer and Alan Mahon.

"Having players like that who were here last year and have come into a bit of form, that's pleasing.

"John Spicer has I think been arguably our best player for the last two games.

"I was disappointed with Mahony down at Cardiff because I thought the game would have been very suited to him, especially the third game in a week, to have to not defend, which is why we put David Unsworth there, but we only got one side of the midfield, which was probably John Spicer, functioning and not Mahony.

"But up until then he's been pretty good.

"Sometimes when fatigue takes over, no matter how much you want to do well, it's very hard to fight, and in that run of seven games in 21 days it was tough for us.

"You always get a few unexpected spanners thrown in the works.

"The first one we had was Besart, the second one was Michael Duff.

"There's a jig-around which we didn't have when we left the field at Colchester."

But Cotterill revealed his troops were looking lively towards the end of the two-week break for internationals.

"If you asked me a couple of weeks ago 'is the break beneficial' you'd say 'yes', I think everyone needed time to get their head out of the sand.

"When you're asking me now when everyone's a bit more refreshed I will say I don't know' because you're always waiting for Saturday's performance.

"The players look good, but then we never have a problem with them in training. "They're an excellent bunch of lads that work to their maximum and they've worked very well this week. "We need the internationals to come back now and them to be all okay and get their head down for another three weeks before we have another break."