MARLON Beresford is enjoying his best ever season of cup football and he admitted: "Long may it continue."

"Out of all the years I have been playing football, this has been the best in terms of runs in the cups. It has been a great experience and it has helped the club."

Last week, the Burnley keeper signed a contract that will take him to the end of the season but he promptly missed a match as his partner Louise was giving birth to their second child.

Now he is just hoping that his heroics against Huddersfield, Spurs and Brentford already this season will not be forgotten when the team to face Fulham in the fifth round of the FA Cup is selected for Sunday.

"Nik (Michopoulos) did well and got a clean sheet at Coventry and so the manager has got a selection dilemma," said Beresford.

"But that is a good thing because I think any keeper would tell you that it is great to have someone else around. If you know there is another good keeper in the background you have to keep right on top of your game. That is what every club needs and Burnley is no different."

Having just celebrated the birth of his daughter Maya, Beresford missed out on the club trip to Portugal but he has been busy working hard at Gawthorpe with the aid of a goalkeeping coach.

Alex Stepney was released in the summer because of the financial problems being faced by the club but in recent weeks former Bolton keeper Keith Branagan has been helping out both Beresford and Michopoulos.

"That has been important and it is great to have Keith around," he said, claiming that the 36-year-old could still be playing professionally if it were not for the injured shoulder that ended his career.

"With everyone else away it has just been me and Keith doing technique work and it has been really good, tremendous. It helps everyone out because Keith wants to become a goalkeeping coach and this is a good way in. At the same time it is good for me and Nik."

While Branagan is hoping he will have a future in the game, Bereford is relieved that he has a slightly more settled future at Turf Moor.

"By signing until the end of the season it has taken away a bit of the uncertainty from having to worry about a new deal around the corner every three weeks or so," he said.

"The aim now is to do as well as I can for the club because there are a lot of big games ahead of us, not just Fulham in the Cup on Sunday.

"There is no way that the league is a lost cause, it is very open at the moment. I know we can improve and we just have to push on."

But for this weekend at least, the push for the play-offs can be put on the back burner as Burnley look to claim another Premiership scalp and earn a place in the quarter-finals of the FA Cup for the first time in 20 years.

Beresford is hoping his hard work with Branagan this week will help him regain his place so that he can play his part.