BURNLEY goalkeeper Marlon Beresford faces surgery next month.

The Clarets number one was due to see a specialist today to identify the extent of the groin injury which forced Beresford to miss Saturday's 1-0 defeat at Stockport County.

It means he could miss the rest of Burnley's Division Two season depending on what the surgeon decides.

Manager Adrian Heath was still not ruling Beresford out of his plans for tomorrow night's vital clash at Wycombe Wanderers but, even at this early stage, he remains a major doubt.

Heath confirmed: "It appears pretty certain that Marlon will have to have an operation to sort the problem out in the summer.

"I am not ruling him out for the rest of the season because it is possible that he may be able to play through the pain barrier in our remaining games.

"It is all in the balance now and we will just have to wait and see what the specialists says. He will just have to abide by his decision."

Deputy keeper Wayne Russell replaced Beresford at Edgeley Park as the Clarets lost ground vital on the play-off pack after substitute Andy Mutch grabbed a late winner. It leaves Burnley in eighth place today and three points adrift of Watford who go to Stockport tonight.

"We need to win three out of last four games to have a chance of the play-offs and I still believe we can do it," said a defiant Heath.

"We should have had something out of the game at Stockport and I thought there were a lot of positive things to come out of the fixture, despite the result.

"It is clear what we have to do now. We have to go to Wycombe and get a result to give our chances a big lift."

Burnley are giving a trial to Southampton midfielder Paul Tisdale and he will feature in tonight's Pontins League Cup semi-final against York City at Bootham Crescent (7pm). The 24-year-old has made 16 Premiership appearances for Southampton, scoring once. Tisdale has also had a short loan spell with Northampton Town.

Everton's Chris Price, who has spent the last few days training with Burnley, is also expected to play.

Burnley from: O'Leary, Pennington, Heffernan, Scott, Heywood, Tisdale, Price, Eastwood, Helliwell, Robinson, Webster, Smith, Graham.

Burnley's A team won 4-1 at Morecambe with goals from David Cotton, Jason Heffernan and Phil Eastwood (2). The B team lost 4-1 at Everton. Dave Collins scored.

Wycombe admission prices, terrace. £10 (Adult), £5 (juniors).

Nigel Gleghorn did not feature in any of the junior games at the weekend. He was hoping to get his first run out since injuring ligaments at Bournemouth in February.

He said: "The weekend came a bit early for me. There may be a chance of a game next week."

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.