DON'T sell Robbie Blake! If alarm bells ever started ringing in my head, it was last week when the club announced the sorry state of its debt.

The cash is drying up, with the £70,000 season ticket fund all spent and another £2.5 million to find to replenish the annual debt.

I've got a horrible feeling that last week's announcement about the Clarets' financial plight is just setting the fans up for an even bigger blow.

But let me tell the board before any knee-jerk action is taken, selling our top scorer is not the way to go about replenishing funds.

Judging by the noises coming from supporters in the town, they have the same fears too. People have been coming up to me all week and asking if Burnley are about to sell Blake.

I don't know if they are or they aren't, but I certainly hope not because that would be a disaster.

He's got 14 goals so far and has been the best player by a mile, so to sell him at this stage of the season when Stan Ternent has already admitted we need eight more wins is just not the way to go.

I understand Wigan have been sniffing round, and it was mentioned last week that Sunderland would be interested.

But I urge the board not to part with Blake, especially for a cut price of, say, £500,000.

Gareth Taylor had just had his best season for Burnley with 18 goals and he was still in his prime when we sold him, so it wouldn't surprise me if the board we planning something similar now.

I had no idea how bad the money situation was but Stan won't want to sell any of his players and the fans definitely won't want to see Blake leave as well.

I think Robbie has taken over from Glen in the transfer department now.

He is proven and still has plenty of goals left in him.

But selling him now would come at a massive price to Burnley.

It just can't happen.

I guess there are a couple of other options for players who could be sold. Young Richard Chaplow has done well but has he done enough to catch the eye of someone who would want to spend money after playing only 20-odd league games.

Everyone thought that Glen Little would be the one to be sold as, two or three years ago he was being backed left, right and centre to be snapped up by a Premiership club.

On a brighter note, I was delighted to see Burnley keep back to back clean sheets with a good result at Crystal Palace.

The central defensive pairing of Mark McGregor and David May did well again, and I'm pleased for Mark that he has been able to force his way back into the side again.

He is an out and out defender, always has been.

Graham Branch can't just change positions at his age, going from a left winger to a centre half.

But I would definitely have Mark in my back line. He's hard to play against and more performances like Saturday would certainly help Stan on the way to his target of eight more wins.