IT could be a case of strikers reunited at St Mary’s tomorrow as Sam Vokes, Charlie Austin and Jay Rodriguez hope to share the same pitch for the first time in nearly five years.

The last time all three featured on the same patch of grass they were all playing for Burnley, in a 1-0 victory at Brighton in December 2011 - a match that also saw Ashley Barnes sent-off after just 12 minutes.

While Burnley-born Rodriguez played the whole game, Vokes was introduced as a half-time substitute and Austin came on in the 66th minute. That was during Vokes’ two-month loan spell at Turf Moor, and on two further occasions he swapped places with Austin to join Rodriguez in attack.

In the summer of 2012 Vokes made his move permanent, but Rodriguez left his boyhood club to join the Saints. A year later Austin was gone, but tomorrow they could be reunited, providing Rodriguez wins his fitness battle.

It was Austin’s departure that allowed Vokes to take centre stage at Turf Moor, and he hasn’t looked back since. In the past month he has led the line for Burnley and Wales, and Dyche believes his experience of playing that lone striker role for the Dragons has helped him to settle in to the Clarets new formation.

“He hasn’t played that much for us but he’s played enough with Wales to understand the role,” he said.

“There are important differences, but the fundamentals are still in the same. It’s tweaks and twists and maybe the defensive role and how you work as defending from the front.

“It’s the change in format with not having a striker next to him. With one coming from deep rather than coming from the frontline into a deeper position.

“Often when it’s a single striker often the stats show he has less touches because the game is played around him.

“Teams that play one up front don’t play it into the front as often, they try and play it from wider positions so that is a difference.

“If you’re not having as many touches you still need to be focused on when you’re needed, to get into the right positions and affect other people’s positions much more, so you’re movement away from the ball becomes really important and how you affect the defenders without even touching the ball.”

Dyche never worked with Rodriguez at Turf Moor, but he is happy to see the striker back.

“He’s so well thought of in these parts for what he did for this club,” he said.

He did work with Austin before the striker was sold to QPR, and he believes his path to the top has helped him.

“Just when he got sold he’d had a really good pre-season, he was in great shape, there was an obvious partnership beginning to build with Ingsy.

“He was adding to his all round game and he’s gone on through himself and coaching input.

“The main thing with Charlie he’s had a life of adapting to the next challenge and he seems to have done that really well.

“He has a real competitive edge and that’s something he probably did learn in the lower leagues, and when he got a chance to build his name in the leagues he’s done it.”