WHEN Tottenham Hotspur stride out at Wembley against Manchester United in the Carling Cup final tomorrow, there will be no shortage of people in Burnley watching on ruefully.

That feeling is sure to extend to the Clarets squad, too, after Owen Coyle’s side were so cruelly denied the first League Cup final appearance in Burnley’s history last month.

Coyle’s men were just two minutes away from a famous semi final triumph over Spurs before Roman Pavlyuchenko and Jermain Defoe struck to shock Turf Moor in the dying seconds of extra time.

As a consequence, instead of preparing for one of the club’s biggest days in recent years this weekend, Burnley will today face a Championship home match against Sheffield Wednesday.

Coyle admits he may not even bother watching tomorrow’s final but is sure his players are already over the disappointment of that heartbreaking semi final.

“I might watch it, I don’t know,” he said. “We’ve got a game today and to be honest it hadn’t crossed my mind whether I’ll watch it or not. I might be at another game.

“With all due respect, I’ve not got millions of pounds so I’m not really going to get a player from Tottenham or Manchester United - first-team players who are playing in a cup final.

“So it might be I’m at a game somewhere else where we can get a player from.”

Asked whether the hurt of missing out on a final appearance could prove to be the extra ingredient needed for an already determined Clarets squad to reach Wembley in the play-offs, Coyle said: “I don’t know if that’s an extra ingredient, but they’ve shown already how they’ve bounced back from that.

“To suffer the blow we did – and there’s no getting away from that – to go to West Brom three days later and give that level of performance, and then kick on from there in the league and the FA Cup, there’s your answer about how they’ve reacted to it.

“That’s what we need now until the end of the season.

“When tomorrow comes around I dare say some of the lads will sit back and watch it, and think ‘What if?’ “But that’s what happens in football. What you have to do is not dwell on that.

“You re-focus and look at what you can achieve. That’s what we’re trying to do.”

But there could be one player featuring in the Carling Cup final who might hold Coyle’s attention.

Eighteen-year-old Danny Welbeck has been promised a starting place for United after scoring three goals in eight first-team appearances this season.

The striker was the subject of an enquiry by Coyle during the summer and the Burnley boss has not ruled out trying to secure a loan deal for the England Under 21 international in the future - if Sir Alex Ferguson ever makes him avaiable.

“I spoke to Sir Alex a couple of times but I have to say, he didn’t beat about the bush about it,” revealed Coyle.

“He has a very high opinion of Danny Welbeck. I think we all know how good a manager he is and how good his judgement is.

“We’d seen Welbeck as a kid and we were trying to do something, but we were probably one of a host of clubs who asked the same question.

“To be fair to Sir Alex, he answered it and said he would doubt it very much because he would be in his plans.

“It was actually in June when I asked the question but he said we’re back training in July, so ring me at the start of July.

“I was going to speak to him about Chris Eagles anyway, so he said ring me back.

“When I did, he said, ‘The boy’s come back and is looking great and we know he’s going to feature in the first team’.

“That was fair enough. But the great thing is you’ve got that route open and that dialogue, and you never know what happens further down the line.”