FRANK Sinclair has vowed to stop Dennis Wise in his tracks when the old pals clash at Coventry tomorrow.

The Burnley skipper played alongside Wise at Chelsea and Leicester before the two players took separate Championship turns.

And Sinclair, who returns from suspension in the nick of time to answer a defensive crisis, is ready to rumble and put a halt to Wise's recent goalscoring run.

He said: "Wisey and I go back a long way. I became a professional at Chelsea the first year he signed and we had great times there, and at Leicester.

"He is a credit to himself and the game and there's no shrewder signing that (City manager) Micky Adams could have made.

"He's even scoring goals now and that's helped get them right out of relegation trouble. Wisey has always chipped in with a goal here and there, but I'll bet he hasn't been on five goals in six games many times in his career.

"He's on fire at the moment and we'll have to make sure we get among him and make sure he doesn't win the game."

Sinclair's timely return helps in the absence of defensive rock John McGreal, who serves a suspension along with Wayne Thomas for the Clarets first ever visit to the Ricoh Arena.

But Burnley are again down to the bare bones, with 16 players available as they look to get back to back defeats out of their system and pick up a first away win since November to leapfrog the Sky Blues in the table.

Sinclair, 34, added: "I haven't played a meaningful game now for three weeks, but I've got a couple of reserve team games under my belt and I'm looking forward to getting back.

"It's been a long old wait and even more frustrating with the last two results. I would have loved the team to keep on winning in my absence and it's just unfortunate that when I come back John McGreal is suspended.

I've lost count of the number of times we've had to change things at the back and it must be so frustrating for the manager after the settled back four we had last season and the number of clean sheets we kept."

Boss Cotterill, who has been plagued by defensive problems all season, insisted: "It's a bonus to have Frank available again and we'll be pleased to have him back.

"I don't think we could permutate any more in the centre of defence - and in other positions. At this moment in time, we just need to take it game by game because we might be completely different next week in terms of the players we have available.

"If we had a settled 11 (players) for the last 10 games we would have picked up a few points on the way and would have been very confident, but I think, in my honest opinion, the top six is out of our reach because of the run we've just been on."