FEW sides have enjoyed as much success against the top six as Burnley this season, but Sean Dyche insists the secret is simply to 'stick to what you believe in'.

How to take on the top six has been a major talking point over the festive period after Newcastle adopted a cautious approach at home to Manchester City in a match that ended in a 1-0 defeat, earning Rafa Benitez plenty of criticism.

But Dyche insists trying to take the big clubs on at their own game would be 'madness'. So far this season the Clarets have won at Chelsea, drawn at Tottenham, Liverpool and Manchester United and suffered injury-time defeats at home to Arsenal and Liverpool. Only the Turf Moor fixture with Spurs and the trip to Manchester City have ended in heavy defeats for Dyche's men.

The Burnley said he had 'understanding' with Benitez's predicament, an when asked for the secret of taking on the top six he said: "You’ve got to do a version of that, to think you’re going to out play Man City when they’ve got arguably the best group of technical players in the world, you’re probably not going to. That would be madness.

"I think it was Graeme Souness you recently talked about Bournemouth taking on Liverpool in their own game, and they got beat 4-0. That’s the opposite view.

"As a manager stick to what you believe in because the outside noise will have every angle and opinion. As a manager stick to what you think is important and never forget you’re judged by results.

"If you can do it in amazing fashion brilliant, if you have to beg, borrow and steal and do it in a different way, equally brilliant because usually teams who do that have a reason for it."

Newcastle's gameplan in the post-Christmas fixture nearly paid off with a late Dwight Gayle chance, although they were fortunate to only be a goal behind at the time.

Dyche said: "If we want it where everyone is competitive, give them all the same amount of money and same wage bill, then it’s about coaching and development of players.

“But it’s not like that and never will be. So you have to respect each manager and each set of players, doing what they need to do to get a result, because that’s your job.

“Secondary, as important for me is development of players, but the actual job is getting results. Finding a way of getting results.

“Spinning it positively, would it be madness for Newcastle to take on Man City the same way City play?

“It would be madness, so you can’t blame the,too much for going the other way.

“If they take their chance at the end, you get a 1-1 and everyone goes ‘great gameplan’."