Just two months after his takeover of Burnley in December, new chairman Alan Pace brought the women’s team under the same umbrella as the men’s and quickly laid out a four-year target of reaching the women’s Championship.
It is one of many ambitions including forming a women’s academy, expanding facilities at their Barnfield Training Centre and extending commercial partners.
Pace – who has three daughters who share his “passion” for women’s sport – refers to Burnley as a “family”.
“It was never really a question of if [the women’s team] would be incorporated into the club – it was a question of when and how,” he told BBC Sport.
“I’m giving ourselves and the team time to grow into it. It would be very easy to invest to bring in players and recreate a new team to play in the WSL.
“That’s not what we’re about. We are about developing. We can have ambition but also allow time to make changes.”
But manager Matt Bee says the support from the club has already been huge.
“It’s nice the players know the club wants to progress to those higher levels and they can actually do it at Burnley,” he added.
“We’re at a position where there is a real clear ambition to get this team into the highest tier possible and we have to embrace that and perform on the pitch to go with it.”
Captain and goalkeeper Lauren Bracewell added: “We did well with what we had before but to get that extra backing from the club spurs us on.
“We have more time on the grass and even just having bits of extra equipment thrown in helps the training sessions be more professional.”