Robbie Blake says he will always regret leaving Burnley - not once but twice

But on both occasions, the former forward feels the situation had been taken out of his hands.

The first time, when he was sold to Birmingham City, the club needed the money. Historically, it had been necessary to cash in on their best assets to stay afloat, and in January 2005 it was Blake’s turn.

MORE TOP STORIES:

Burnley’s £1million signing from Bradford City returned, via Leeds United, two and a half years later, to fulfil his ambition of getting the Clarets into the Premier League.

But while his second Turf Moor exit was ultimately his decision, he admits it still leaves a bitter taste.

“The second time was my worst one, when I left for Bolton. But what the fans don’t know is my position became untenable with Brian Laws,” said Blake, who had been re-signed by Steve Cotterill for £250,000 in the summer of 2007.

“There were arguments.

“If you’ve got that going on, you’re not going to be happy.”

Cotterill’s successor Owen Coyle’s switch from Burnley to Bolton, mid-Premier League season, was not only a huge turning point for the club, but one that had consequences for Blake personally.

A backroom staff exodus in January 2010 had left a chasm that needed to be filled.

But for Blake, Brian Laws was not the answer.

Instead, the appointment was the catalyst for cutting Turf ties again.

“The first training session we had on the pitch, Russ Wilcox, the assistant manager came up to me and said ‘What’s the Premier League like? I’ve only worked in League Two and Three (Championship and League One)’,” Blake explained.

“I was thinking ‘Do you not watch Match of the Day?’ “It’s the best league in the world, surely as a manager or as a coach you want to better yourself so you watch the best.

“I was obviously a senior player then, so I was walking away thinking ‘What’s going on?’.

“He (Laws) didn’t want to play me. He was fooling people saying I was injured or I hadn’t trained for a few days and Fletch (Steven Fletcher) and all of them would see me in the corridors and they’d ask if I was injured and I’d say ‘No, I’m fit’.

“I was there to play.

“I had a meeting with Brendan Flood and said ‘As long as this guy’s at the football club I can’t be here’.

“I wasn’t trying to make trouble for anyone else, but I just couldn’t be there.

“It was a personality thing; it was everything. Off the field, on the field.

“Coyley came in for me at Bolton and I thought ‘He knows me, he knows what I’m about, I might as well go there’, because I wasn’t going to be involved or happy here in the circumstances.”

There was a backlash from supporters, and the fans’ favourite accepts why.

“You can understand it because they don’t see the full ins and outs. They see their better players leaving. They don’t see everything that goes on.

“That’s the hard thing, because you can’t come out in the press or go on the radio or tv and say ‘Hang on a minute, this is the situation’ because that doesn’t do anybody any favours and creates and environment and ends up making me look bad.

“I told Brendan though.

“I can’t tell you exactly what I said.”

Blake was offered a new contract at Burnley but because of his breakdown in relations with Laws he felt he needed a fresh start and accepted Bolton’s offer, and the chance to stay in the Premier League.

Yet when Laws left the following December, replaced by Eddie Howe, Blake wondered if he should have stayed.

“It was great at Bolton because I knew the manager and I was going to a Premier League club.

“The season started and I played a few games. It was good to be part of it.

“But at the back of my mind I still wanted to be here,” said Blake, speaking at Turf Moor.

“But I just couldn’t have been while he (Laws) was.

“Once Brian left and Eddie came in after that, I just wish I would have signed. But I couldn’t have signed.

“You can’t predict what’s going to happen.

“Although I did think he (Laws) was going to struggle, you can’t make a decision based on that because there is always ‘What if’. I thought ‘I’ve got to go with what’s happening now, rather than wait’.

“I probably would have played a lot more in the Championship, but I had to do it.”

After describing the start of his second spell with Burnley as “like coming home”, Blake prefers to reflect on the good Turf times rather than the bad.

“I had some great years here and an amazing time here,” he said.

“I wouldn’t change it for anything.”

TOMORROW: Blake’s big break, meeting the Queen and life after football