EMBARRASSING. Unprofessional. Unacceptable. Call it what you will, but Burnley Football Club is close to being in crisis.

Unless Steve Cotterill can work the oracle over the next seven days and bring in five or six new faces, a long hard winter lies ahead.

What happened at Vicarage Road on Saturday has been threatening to happen for a year. Last season, Burnley got through courtesy of avoiding an injury crisis. All that happened at Watford was that the chickens simply came home to roost.

Where to start? We had, as Stan Ternent used to say, "kids on men's errands" as Messrs Bermingham, McCann and Lafferty manfully plugged the gaps. We had one recognised defender on the pitch at full time. We had Frank Sinclair stretchered off, having been forced to play with an injury. We had McGreal and Thomas - subs who weren't really subs because their injuries prevented them taking to the field of play. And when the manager needed to change things, he looked to the bench and saw his 38-year-old first team coach.

How has it come to this? How have things got to a stage where Burnley FC cannot muster 16 fit players for a game of football.

Cotterill's preference of quality over quantity is totally understandable, but with time forcing the manager's hand, we have reached the point where there is no option but to take a few gambles on some unknown quantities, be that either from the club's own youth set-up or from what remains on the out of contract/free agents lists.

Such an argument presumes that money is available to the manager. And given that the Clarets made an unsuccessful £125,000 bid for Clive Clarke about a month ago, one could be forgiven for thinking that there is at least a little bit left to play with.

Then again, maybe Barry Kilby has had a rethink and decided the coffers are empty. One can understand the chairman's fiscal prudence to a degree. The dire straits the club found itself in after the ITV Digital collapse may well have engendered a conservative attitude in Kilby. But unless the manager is allowed to bring more bodies in, the chairman will be presiding over dwindling attendances and a scrap for survival.

Steve Cotterill has done well for Burnley FC so far. It's time for the board to reciprocate and find some cash from somewhere. Or face the consequences.