1956: Born June 3, Cumnock.

1972: Joins Ipswich as an apprentice.

1973: Makes senior debut against Manchester United at Old Trafford, and given the job of marking George Best.

1978: Member of the Ipswich side which upset the odds to defeat Arsenal 1-0 in FA Cup final.

1981: Injury forces him out of Ipswich's UEFA Cup final triumph over AZ Alkmaar. Town miss out on First Division title on last day, finishing runners-up to Aston Villa and beaten by Manchester City in FA Cup semi-final.

1985: Joins Sunderland - then managed by Saints legend Lawrie McMenemy - after making 500 appearances for Ipswich.

1988: Joins Gillingham.

1989: Joins Motherwell.

1990: Appointed player-manager of Ayr United.

1993: Moves to Falkirk as a player before returning to Motherwell as player-coach.

1994: June - crosses border again to become player-manager of Colchester. Loses first five league games in charge.

December - returns to Ipswich four days after resigning at Colchester.

May 1995: Ipswich are relegated from the Premiership, though they were well adrift when Burley joined before Christmas.

1995-96: Builds an exciting young side which tops the divisional scoring charts but just misses out on the Division One play-offs.

1996-97: Loses play-off semi-final to Sheffield United on away goals.

1997-98: Takes Ipswich into play-offs again, only to fall to Charlton in semi-finals.

1998-99: Ipswich make play-offs for third year running but this time bow out to Bolton in semi-finals on away goals.

1999-2000: Ipswich miss out on automatic promotion on last day of season. Defeat Bolton 5-3 on aggregate to finally make it to Wembley play-off final where they beat Dave Bassett's Barnsley 4-2. Among Burley's promotion winners are ex-Saints midfielder Jim Magilton and current midfielder Jermaine Wright.

2000-01: Ipswich sensationally finish fifth in Premiership to earn a place in the UEFA Cup - only missing out on a Champions League spot on the final day of the season. On their way Marcus Stewart bags a hat-trick in a 3-0 win at The Dell in what was Stuart Gray's first match in charge of Saints. That is one of nine away league wins. No club managed more in the Premiership that season. Named manager of the year by the League Managers' Association.

2001-02: Despite wins over Torpedo Moscow and Helsingborgs, UEFA Cup adventure ends with a 4-1 defeat in the San Siro at the hands of Inter Milan. Ipswich make a terrible start to the league campaign and relegation is confirmed on the final day of the season with a 5-0 loss at Liverpool.

2002: Ipswich win a place in the UEFA Cup through the Fair Play League but, after winning their first two Division One games, Town's league form slumps, with a 3-0 defeat at Grimsby a low point.

Oct 11: with Ipswich 19th in the table, Burley is sacked.

Oct 30: turns down Stoke job and Tony Pulis is appointed instead.

2003: Mar 31: appointed as interim manager of Derby after the Rams suspend previous manager John Gregory in a bid to investigate allegations of serious misconduct.

May 6: signs a two-year contract with the Rams after Gregory was dismissed for misconduct reasons. He later wins £1m in compensation.

May 2004: in Burley's first full season in charge at Pride Park, Derby escape relegation from the Championship by a single point.

Summer 2004: Makes some shrewd signings, in particular Inigo Idiakez and Grzegorz Rasiak on Bosman frees from Real Vallenco and Italians Siena respectively. With Polish international striker Rasiak scoring 17 goals and Spanish midfielder Idiakez on target 11 times, County finish fourth in the Championship, but lose semi-final play-off to Billy Davies' Preston. Their record of 12 away league wins is only beaten by champions Sunderland.

June 7: Resigns as manager of Derby.

Burley tells local radio that he quit because he felt he had been been let down by the club's board. Burley claims there was an on-going issue which proved impossible to resolve, widely understood to be his worsening relationship with Derby's director of football, Murdo Mackay. Burley was unhappy with Mackay's role and with the decision to sell Tom Huddlestone to Spurs.

Burley reveals that chief executive Jeremy Keith had apologised to him over the board's failure to act on the situation.

Burley's departure came not long after Derby's players had been asked to confirm allegations that Burley had supervised training while drunk. The players refused to give evidence. Burley said he was "deeply hurt" by the accusations.

June 30: appointed head coach at Scottish Premier League club Hearts. Burley hardly spends any money in the summer, but makes some superb Bosman signings from all over Europe. Virtual unknowns Roman Bednar (a striker from Mlada Boleslav), Panagiotis Fyssas (a Greek international defender from Benfica), goalkeeper Steve Banks (Gillingham), Czech midfielder Michel Pospisil (Slovan Liberec) and Senegalese defender Ibrahim Tall (Sochaux) were all signed permanently. Three more foreigners, meanwhile, were brought in on loan - Czech midfielder Rudi Skacel (Marseille), Lithuanian striker Edgaras Jankauskas (FBK Kaunas) and Brazilian midfielder Samuel Almeida Camazzola (Juventude). Amazingly, Hearts start the season with eight consecutive league wins.

October 21: Lithuanian businessman Vladimir Romanov takes his shareholding in the club to 55 per cent. Burley says: "It's great news. One of the reasons I came to Hearts was after speaking to Mr Romanov."

Oct 22: With Hearts three points clear of Celtic at the top, Burley leaves club.

Oct 31: There are rumours that Burley is asked to return to Hearts after protests by fans following a 2-0 Edinburgh derby loss to Hibernian.

Dec 22: Saints announce Burley is their new head coach.

Dec 26: Burley's first game in charge sees Saints lose 3-0 at Watford.

January 2006: Burley's Saints clearout begins in spectacular fashion with Theo Walcott, Brett Ormerod, Rory Delap, Antti Niemi, Nigel Quashie, Matthew Mills and Thomaz Hajto among the names to leave. In their place he brings in loanees such as Rasiak, Wright, Richard Chaplow and Peter Madsen.

April: Saints finish in mid-table in the Championship after winning five and drawing one of their last seven league games.

May: Burley completes the £2m signing of Rasiak from Spurs.

June: Burley has a new board of directors to work with after chairman Rupert Lowe and his supporters resign to be replaced by Michael Wilde and his regime.

July/August: The new board allow Burley to spend over £5m to sign the likes of Kelvin Davis, Pele, Bradley Wright-Phillips, Rudi Skacel and Inigo Idiakez.

May 2007: Saints qualify for the Championship play-off finals after winning their last three league games of the regular season to finish sixth. But for the second time in three seasons, Burley is beaten by a Billy Davies team - this time Derby County. The Rams come from behind to win the first leg 2-1 at St Mary's and, after Saints had won 3-2 at Pride Park, Davies' men hold their nerve to progress to Wembley in a penalty shoot-out.

Summer: Defenders Gareth Bale and Chris Baird are sold to help balance the books. Burley also loses striker Kenwyne Jones shortly after the start of the 2007/08 season to Sunderland.

August: Burley sees Saints lose 4-1 at home to Crystal Palace on the opening day of the season. Saints then lose 2-1 at two divisions lower Peterborough in the Carling Cup two days later.

October: Burley suffers his heaviest league loss as Saints boss - 5-1 at Preston.

November: Saints fare even worse at another struggling outfit, Sheffield Wednesday - thrashed 5-0 at Hillsborough. Alex McLeish quits Scotland for Birmingham towards the end of the month.

January 2008: Saints fans continue to pile the criticism on Burley after a 3-0 home loss to Watford on New Year's Day.

Jan 19: Reports suggest Burley is down to the last two in the race for the Scotland job along with Motherwell boss Mark McGhee.

Jan 22: Burley appears the Scottish FA's first choice.