Monday 3pm kick off Well Our best team is? our best formation is? I always think City will win but the problems have been apparent for a long time and selles is struggling to figure out how to correct it. No threat. No intent. No urgency. So he’s hanging on and hoping but this lot aren’t giving it 100% imho. I imagine after a game they all look at their stats to see that they’ve had a good game and they’re happy with that, forget the result.
Somewhat chocked by the odds Can't find where I change to fractional for you lot But basically 5/6, 11/5 & 10/3 Sure, Preston in poor form etc but... Can't see more than 1 goal in it
It’s the first absolute must win for me. Teams in the bottom 3 in striking distance. We can’t afford to let it leave our hands.
I think if we set up something like this, with the intent to control things a bit we could do well. ............................Pandur Coyle..........Egan.............Hughes.......Macca/Drameh ........................Alzate.......Puerta ................................Crooks*banned in which case, Id play Slater next to Alzate and move Puerta up here. ........Kamara............Pedro...............Joseph Crooks taking some criticisms but I think he's one of the few players we have at the moment thats calm on the ball and can bring others into play, he also gets in to the box a lot. Joseph good for pressing and stretching the play/trying to get in behind. No chance he leaves Gelhardt out and it's a tough call but I just feel he needs a bit of a reset and can imagine him coming off the bench and doing well.
Well Crooks is Crooked with his red card... Let's go all out attack from the start, Kamara and Amrabatty as the wingers, and Gelheart of the midfield, Pedro up front, other random midfielders, usual defence except Egan in the back four and St Pandur of the Net keeping our Faith...
Don’t see any other options, really. Palmer has been pants, McLoughlin too slow and Crooks suspended. This season can’t end quickly enough.
1-0 City. Joseph to start and score his first goal (sort of Manucho like) If we lose this we are gone.
I’ve thought for a long time, I don’t fancy us to get much from Derby or Portsmouth. This is a must win if ever there was one . But I don’t think we will win unfortunately
Preston are not going to rollover for us on Monday, make no mistake about that. They have sold out their away allocation and it is a big day for their fans, the one away day a season when they dress up in some traditional way. They did it here a couple of seasons too, Ebenezors in town had their bar staff dressed in PNE shirts to welcome them and they packed the place out. So it will not be easy and it will be noisy. We have to more than match them in every aspect or we are sunk. I hope everyone realises this.
Not quite true looking at their forum. Sold 1500 as of Wednesday and they don't seem to be a happy bunch, but I'm sure we'll see to that. Players in Bowler hats will be a different take on the usual post match away team celebrations and taking the piss though.
The away game report Sounds familiar doesnt it Brad Potts fired Preston North End to a first home win in seven league outings at Deepdale to pile further pressure on struggling Hull City. Paul Heckingbottom's side have endured a frustrating run of five draws and one defeat since beating Coventry in the middle of October. But Potts' cool finish on the hour mark, his second in three games, secured all three points for North End and only a second victory in their past 13 matches. It edged Preston away from the drop zone and into 15th place but left Ruben Selles' Tigers, now without a win in seven on the road, right in the mix at the bottom of the table. Defeat saw former Reading manager's new side, in his fourth game in the Tigers dugout, drop a place into the final relegation place in 22nd. Preston have been struggling to convert winning positions into points. Just two matches back they were good enough to hold promotion hopefuls Leeds United to a draw with another Potts goal only cancelled out in the dying minutes. Yet a slip against Hull City would have been a second poor result on the bounce following last Saturday's defeat against QPR so this victory will deliver a welcome boost going into a second Christmas assignment against Sheffield Wednesday at Deepdale on Sunday. For Hull, their struggles continue, particularly away from home where they are still looking for a first clean sheet of the season. They were, at times, decent going forward and had chances to both take the lead and draw level. It was also a result though which could reduce Selles' honeymoon period in the job with tough-looking home fixtures against Middlesbrough and Leeds next up. The Tigers had started on the front foot, pinning back a slow-starting North End and carving the game's first and perhaps best chance inside six minutes. Freddie Woodman deserves huge credit for an excellent reaction save, getting down to his right sharply to deny Joao Pedro's fierce shot from just inside the box. But in blocking the ball out to his right, he presented Regan Slater with a near open goal only for the Hull midfielder to side-foot over from six yards out. It was a let-off which stung Preston into action, the hosts putting together a couple of decent moves as the half wore on and, but for a lack of composure and quality in front of goal, they could have taken the lead. To Preston's credit though repeated mistakes did not deter them and with the pressure building steadily as the game reached the hour mark a breakthrough arrived. It was a good move and a good finish, too. Mads Frojkaer-Jensen sprung Kaine Kesler-Hayden in the left channel and his cut-back met a tidy finish from 12 yards out by Potts - his angled side foot past Ivor Pandur delivering his third goal of the season. Preston deserved the lead but were made to sweat after spurning chances to put the game to bed. As the final whistle approached they had cause to thank the excellent Woodman for safeguarding those points. With four minutes of normal time left, Woodman produced a fine reaction to paw away Cody Drameh's dangerous cross and the Preston keeper was also on hand in the sixth minute of stoppage time to gather Gustavo Puerta's headed effort.
I really cannot see this one been anything other than “Typical City “. No fight ,no bottle I really hope I am wrong but I have been going a long long time now ….
