Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe faces a difficult team selection this evening for the visit of Southampton.
Russell Martin’s in-form, possession mad Saints make the long trip up to Deepdale for midweek Championship football. The former Swansea boss has taken his passing style of football down to St Mary’s and North End’s work off the ball will have to be spot on. Lowe’s side head into the game sitting fourth in the table, but without a win in five. Changes across the backline are not expected, with Andrew Hughes (calf), Calvin Ramsay (knee) and Jack Whatmough (hamstring) all set to miss out again.
Therefore, Jordan Storey, Liam Lindsay and Greg Cunningham should continue. Down the left flank, Liam Millar could replace Robbie Brady to inject added pace to proceedings while club captain Alan Browne will likely come into the side. Preston’s formation on the night will be interesting, with Lowe having mainly used 3-4-2-1 this season but also going with 3-5-2, 4-4-2 and 4-2-3-1 across the campaign. Browne’s out of possession energy and intensity could be vital on a night when Ali McCann (calf) is not available.
Should he get the nod then one of Mads Frokjaer - who has two goals in his last two - or Duane Holmes could drop to the bench. That is not an easy decision. It’s a three game week for PNE though and rotation will come into Lowe’s thinking, with it a quick turnaround to Hull City after taking on Southampton. Ben Woodburn, who has been hailed as one of North End’s best ‘pressers’ by Lowe previously, could also be an option. Up top, Preston’s boss has Will Keane, Milutin Osmajic, Ched Evans and Layton Stewart to pick from, with one up top the most likely.
Ahead of the game, Lowe said: “Obviously they had a blip in terms of not winning as many games as they’d have liked but then they’ve gone on a nice run of winning games of football. They’re a good footballing team and they’re well coached. As everyone knows, they’ll play loads of passes but what we’ve got to do is make sure that we worry about what we can do on the day I think. Under the lights at Deepdale is always a special occasion and we’ll have our own gameplan to go into, and hopefully we can take a positive result.”
Here’s our predicted XI for the midweek encounter.
