Preston North End

Preston boss Paul Heckingbottom praised his side's character after they came back to beat Stoke and end their seven-game winless run in the Championship.

Heckingbottom feared it would be more pain for Preston when Stoke took an early lead and was delighted with the way his side responded with Alfie Devine scoring twice and Milutin Osmajic once.

He told BBC Radio Lancashire: "Listen, I've been saying it's about the wins. No-one is interested in what you say when you're not winning, you know it's about the win.

"We have played well in previous games and not got over the line and today we started really well again, and then their first pass, their first cross, they score.

"We had that against Norwich, where we started the better team, made a mistake and they go one up. Kenny McLean puts one in the top corner from a free-kick.

"We were the dominant team, but we couldn't get the goal, couldn't get the points. Today we did, so, yeah, that will make everyone feel better, definitely.

"The performance was excellent from start to finish and we turned the game round from that difficult start, and it wasn't just me thinking 'here we go again', so, yeah, it's great."

Preston North End boss Paul Heckingbottom has called for "realism" amongst fans amid a difficult spell at the club.

The Lilywhites were fourth in the Championship table in January, but are now 17th after winning just one of their past 12 matches.

And while Heckingbottom understands the fans' anger, he also feels the expectations were raised too high during the first half of the season.

"If we are a team who are bottom three budget and bottom three in terms of net spend, why should we be expected to beat the teams that aren't?" the 48-year-old told BBC Radio Lancashire.

"I've always said it's not about money and it's not. If we look at the teams at the bottom, some of them have huge wage bills. But we need to make sure we are going in the right direction about that.

"There's other teams still fighting, there is other teams spending, there is other teams still chasing what we are chasing. We have no right to be any better than the other teams we are playing against."

Striker Milutin Osmajic has trained and will be available for Friday evening's game against Stoke City (20:00 GMT) after spending their defeat by Norwich City on the bench.

But both midfielder Ali McCann (ankle) and defender Lewis Gibson (shoulder) will need to wait until after the international break to make their respective returns.

"We were not ruling him [McCann] out because he was feeling really positive but he's not made it," Heckingbottom added.

"Gibbo [Gibson] has trained but I think we rule him out. He's not been strong enough in his arm."

Listen to the full interview on BBC Sounds

Listen to more Preston North End content on BBC Sounds

Having both spent time in the top six earlier this season, Preston North End and Stoke City will look to rescue their campaigns when they meet at Deepdale on Friday (20:00 GMT).

Stoke put in an impressive display to beat promotion hopefuls Watford 3-1 on the weekend to reignite some embers of hope for their own push, though they are still nine points short of sixth place.

While hosts Preston might have their eyes glancing in a different direction. After winning their first two games of 2026, they have only won once since (against Portsmouth in February) and are now closer to the bottom three than the top six.

• Each of the last three league meetings between Preston and Stoke have ended level, including two 0-0s; as many goalless draws as in their previous 18 league games combined.

• Stoke haven't lost any of their last five away league games against Preston (W3 D2), which is already their longest ever unbeaten run away to the Lilywhites.

• Preston have lost their last four Championship games – they last lost five in a row in the same league campaign in their final five matches of the 2023-24 campaign, under Ryan Lowe.

• Since the start of December 2025, only two teams have won fewer points away from home in the Championship than Stoke (8) – West Brom (3) and Sheffield Wednesday (1).

• After scoring five goals in seven Championship starts for Preston between October and December 2025, Daniel Jebbison has only netted in one of his last nine (one goal v Swansea).

Image source, Getty Images

There have been plenty of contentious decisions in the 2025-26 Championship season so far.

Offside goals given, perfectly good goals ruled out, red card offences missed, penalties not given, dubious spot-kicks awarded. You name it.

With the video assistant referee (VAR) only used for the play-off final, the outcome of every second-tier game in the regular season can hinge on how on-field officials see incidents in real time.

• Would you want VAR introduced for every league game in the Championship?

• If so, why?

• And if not, let us know your reasons.

You can share your thoughts on VAR here or comment below, and we will publish a follow-up article soon with a selection of your responses.

Andy Bayes
Sports editor, BBC Radio Lancashire

Image source, Shutterstock

In the space of 12 league matches, Preston North End have dropped 13 places in the Championship.

It's about as dramatic a fall from grace as you're likely to see.

They were three points off the automatic promotion places on 4 January with a 19-point buffer between themselves and the relegation spots.

The numbers are alarmingly different 69 days later.

They are now 21 points adrift of second-placed Middlesbrough, 11 off the play-offs and 10 from the bottom three.

The 2-0 win at Bristol City 12 games ago felt like a big moment. A vocal away support singing their heroes home, with a manager growing in popularity game by game.

Speaking to the Lancashire Post, external in his after-match interview at Norwich on Saturday, Paul Heckingbottom was clear in his opinion that staying in the Championship wasn't a foregone conclusion.

He pinpointed a dramatic drop-off last season, where North End won only once in the league after the victory at Norwich on 11 February, as a case in point.

The final day survival last season should have been a wake-up call, and for a while it looked like it had been.

Granted, the squad has undergone significant change, but since they won at Norwich 13 months ago, they've played 53 league matches, and they haven't won 40 of them. Draws have been an Achilles heel in both seasons, but in the last four games a draw has looked far from likely.

The stats show that they had 15 attempts at the Norwich goal on Saturday, but I can't honestly remember describing a full-stretch save from Canaries keeper Vladan Kovacevic to keep them at bay.

Andrew Hughes will be disappointed with a header that went well wide, and Michael Smith failed to make contact with the ball four yards out to reduce the arrears to 2-1.

Norwich's quadruple change on the hour looked like they firmly believed that the points were already safely in the bag after being far from brilliant themselves.

Not for the first time this season, a 34-year-old central midfielder was the star of this Championship show. Kenny McLean is another second-tier player ageing like a fine wine. He had time and space on the pitch when others didn't. His free kick to make it 2-0 was a touch of class, although had the North End wall jumped, it could have made a difference.

Clearly it's a time of frustration. Was enough done to strengthen a promotion push in January? Is the squad better off for January? The manager said it would be criminal if the squad didn't come out of the winter window better off.

This is season 11 back in the second tier for North End. On one hand, that's an achievement that a lot of clubs and fans of others could only dream of. On the other hand, some fans are looking at it feeling that under its current guise, they've reached their ceiling.

The owners of the club, the Hemmings family, have made no secret of the fact that they'd like to hand over the keys sooner rather than later. They have to plug a sizeable hole on the balance sheet every year, and it's not something they see going on forever.

Whatever league position they finish on 2 May, it's undoubtedly going to be another busy summer at Deepdale. The likes of Daniel Jebbison, Lewis Dobbin and Alfie Devine will return to their Premier League parent clubs with another four senior players out of contract.

It's massively important that they go into the summer break having arrested this horrendous run which has terminally damaged their season.

Preston North End manager Paul Heckingbottom believes his players "made it hard" for themselves following their 2-0 loss at Norwich City on Saturday.

Ali Ahmed and Kenny McLean's first half goals succumbed the Rams to their 13th loss of the season and they are now on a four match losing streak in the Championship.

They currently sit in 17th place in the table on 49 points.

"Another tough one. We had a bright start and had the best chance of the game, and then a moment, a lapse in concentration," Heckingbottom told BBC Radio Lancashire after the match.

"Odel[uga Offiah] was the correct side, they take the shot, Odel is the wrong side and we're one down, which gets compounded by a referee decision.

"Those are the things that are costing us. But after a bright start, we knew that we were still in the game and we knew we'd made it hard for ourselves, but we responded in the right way.

"The big frustration is that we didn't score. If we'd have taken any one of those chances, we'd have made it much more difficult for Norwich because we were the team in the ascendancy in terms of territory and chances in the second half, but we never made them feel that tension and anxiety that can come if we'd have got a goal."

Preston North End will be seeking an end to their winless spell when they face their table neighbours Norwich City at Carrow Road on Saturday (15:00 GMT).

Just one point separates Preston from the Canaries in the midtable.

But while the hosts are on a three-match winning streak, the visitors will be looking for their first victory in seven league games (D2 L4).

• Norwich City have won two of their last 10 league games against Preston North End (D5 L3) and are winless in three (D2 L1).

• Following a 1-0 win there in 2024-25, Preston are looking for consecutive away league wins against Norwich for the first time ever.

• Norwich City have lost nine of their 14 league games this season than have kicked off at 3pm on a Saturday (W3 D2).

• Preston manager Paul Heckingbottom is unbeaten in his last five league games against Norwich City (W2 D3) since a 2-1 loss with Leeds in April 2018.

• Preston's Brad Potts has been involved in two goals in his last four Championship games against Norwich City (1 goal, 1 assist), with an assist for their 90th minute equaliser in the first fixture this season.

Preston North End boss Paul Heckingbottom conceded his side were outplayed by the "hunger and drive" of Championship leaders Coventry City on Wednesday.

The Lilywhites trailed 2-0 at the break and then found themselves 3-0 down early in the second half, after a penalty award which was hotly disputed by his team.

They have now won just one of their last 11 league games.

Heckingbottom told BBC Radio Lancashire: "We knew it was going to be a difficult place to come because they are really at it and they didn't disappoint.

"They were really hungry from minute one, how they competed when they lost the ball. We weren't brilliant with the ball all night but I thought we were a bit loose early on with their pressure.

"With the first goal, you can say they've earned their luck but the second goal we are disappointed with.

"We lost three first contacts, really, in the box, Dan [Iversen] makes a good save, but that hunger and drive is why they are up there and scoring all the goals.

"And, listen, it's not a penalty. Their lads have said that. That sort of took the game away from us.

"I felt good about the second half, we thought we'd get that little bit of luck, and that made it a tough night.

"We felt we had one at the other end but it didn't come."

Preston North End manager Paul Heckingbottom has been speaking to the media before Wednesday's visit to league leaders Coventry City (20:00 GMT).

Here are the main talking points:

• Callum Lang has strained his hamstring whilst recovering from a knock and is unlikely to feature until after the international break. Heckingbottom told BBC Radio Lancashire that due to "his history, it would be too risky" for him to return sooner.

• Lewis Gibson has torn a shoulder muscle making him "a doubt" for the matchday squad. Goalkeeper Daniel Iversen returned to training fully this week. He is "fit and available" so could travel to Coventry.

• The Championship "is a hard league, an unforgiving league" which is why Heckingbottom says North End have slipped down to 13th in the table after dropping too many points in a five-game winless run.

• He cites "conceding too many goals" as the key reason Preston have fallen away from the play-off spots.

• Their next opponents Coventry City are "a dangerous team", he says. "They've got firepower, they're never out of it. They win games when they're not playing well because they have that firepower."

• Heckingbottom's message to fans is "to stay with the team". "We are up against it and we have to battle and fight," he adds. "We need everyone to do that, we need the fans to do that as well.

Listen to the full interview with Paul Heckingbottom and more North End on BBC Sounds.

Image source, Opta

Coventry will seek to at least maintain their advantage at the top of the Championship when they host Preston on Wednesday night (20:00 GMT).

Despite going eight-points clear of Middlesbrough courtesy of a 2-0 win at Bristol City on Saturday, the Sky Blues' fifth straight win, Boro did pull within five points with a big win at QPR on Sunday, and will host Charlton, also on Wednesday evening.

Preston went down 3-1 at home to lowly Oxford United on Friday and have slipped into the bottom half for the first time this season after a run of five games without a win.

• Coventry have won just one of their past 24 league games against Preston (D9 L14), though it was in this exact fixture last season (2-1).

• Preston have only failed to score in one of their past 20 away league games against Coventry, while they've kept a clean sheet on four of their last six visits.

• Coventry have lost just three of their 32 home league games under Frank Lampard (W24 D5). These losses came against Leeds, Burnley (both of whom were promoted last season) and current promotion chasers Ipswich.

• Having lost just two of their first 11 away league games this season (W4 D5), Preston have now lost three of their past six on the road (W1 D2).

• Haji Wright has scored six goals in five home league games in 2026, with these accounting for 67% of Coventry's home goals this calendar year (6/9).

Andy Bayes
Sports editor, BBC Radio Lancashire

Image source, Getty Images

"A soft touch defending our box" was the verdict of Preston North End boss Paul Heckingbottom. He was absolutely spot on.

His team didn't show anywhere near enough to beat an Oxford side who thoroughly deserved to win at Deepdale on Friday night and could have scored more.

For the time being, it lifted them out of the relegation zone after back-to-back wins in the space of six days.

On New Year's Day, North End brushed aside Sheffield Wednesday 3-0, and a play-off challenge looked on.

They followed it up with a win at Bristol City, and the automatic promotion places didn't look a million miles away.

Fast forward 10 league games and six defeats, three draws, and one win later, it looks like a mid-table finish at best.

The question is, what has gone wrong over the last 10 games?

To me, it's not just one thing.

The form of the players isn't what it was earlier in the season; there was a lot of evidence of that against Oxford. We're not just talking one or two players.

The loss of goalkeeper Daniel Iversen to injury. The points per game ratio with him in the side is so much better than it is when he's missing.

That's indisputable but also a touch unfair on Dai Cornell, who hasn't been anything like solely responsible for the goals that have been going past him.

Harrison Armstrong's loan from Everton has expired. It's pretty clear that Armstrong is a real talent, a Premier League player and any Championship club would miss him. But he was only on the winning side six times in a North End shirt.

And the much-maligned pitch will also take a share of the blame.

They have to do better on it. Hull, Derby, Wigan, Millwall and now Oxford have all shown that it's more than possible to produce winning performances on a surface where the ball doesn't run particularly true.

The players must rise to the challenge in the next two games, which are among the toughest on the road.

Trips to Coventry and Norwich would test any team at this level right now.

It's getting the basics so much better; that will be a really good start. Get back to being the North End team that impressed so much earlier this campaign.

"Let's focus on being a team that no one wants to play against because a manager has not said that to me in a while," was a telling line from Heckingbottom after this one.

Image source, Shutterstock

Earlier we asked what you make of the news that, from next season, the Championship play-offs will be expanded to include the teams finishing seventh and eighth?

It was announced on Thursday morning that EFL clubs voted in favour of expanding the play-offs from four to six teams.

Here's a selection of your comments...

Josh, Derby: I don't believe this is necessary. I do think that the play-off format should be aligned throughout the top five leagues, but expanding isn't needed. Better distribution of the monies involved and establishing a clear matchday structure to balance various men's and women's leagues would be a better use of everyone's time. This strikes me undue American influence.

Callum, Dartford: I think it's a good thing so teams can push for promotion that thought they wouldn't get near the play-offs.

Cato, Sheffield: If we adopted it to this season, it means that eighth-placed Derby (on 51 points) have about as much a chance of going up as third-placed Millwall (on 63 points). Plus, to accommodate the extra games, would they extend the season into June? I don't like the idea of it at all, and I hope it's short-lived.

Steve, London: Another example of football being ruined, week by week. Don't you dare think about implementing VAR too.

Mark, Stafford: As a Stoke fan, I think it's good news. The season has come to a grinding halt due to being decimated by injuries. Add to that, the quality of what is coming down from the Premier League, it would mean upsets can happen and still allow teams in that mid-table race to dream of greater heights!

Richard, Stansted: Absolutely ridiculous. What is the point of a league format if you are going to make it a bigger lottery to include even more teams at the end of the season? It also brings teams that are even less ready to actually be in the Premier League into scope. But mostly it's the undermining of the league format which makes no sense. I'm a Derby fan - and we look like we would have a chance of benefiting from this if it were in place this season.

Andy, Nuneaton: Anything that expands the opportunities for those outside of the parachute teams is a good thing. We need to get away from this elite view of the Premier League. If it was up to them, they'd stop automatic promotion and relegation and have a system like Rugby Union, where it's based on meeting certain criteria. The eighth-placed club in the Championship getting to the PL? Bring it on!

Ron, Hayling: Money, Money, Money. Players complain about the amount of games they play with the league games and cup competitions so the intention is to play even more at the end of the season. Owners will make some money but that's all that matters!

Barry, Dartford: Yes it's a fantastic for everyone, all the small teams as well as the big boys, to have something to play for. It will give the end of the season something to look forward to.

Benjamin, Poole: I'm a Charlton fan, so it's unlikely we'll come 8th in the Championship any time soon, however, this is ridiculous. More pandering to Americans to make it more likely they'll make money, which is the only thing they care about. Sporting integrity out of the window again. Shame as I felt the Championship was the last bastion of quality and integrity combined. Game has gone.

Broughton, Derby: Absolute ridiculous, put it back to the old days of three straight up, no play-offs. If you don't make top-three you don't deserve to go up.

Julian, London: The worst decision from a footballing point of view ever! The National League teams have been trying to change their system to be like the current EFL system so it seems a very strange decision for the EFL to take. You can finish 8th after 46 games and still get promoted - sporting integrity has been totally lost with this decision. Money over integrity every time!

Image source, Opta

The Championship weekend gets under way at Deepdale on Friday night (20:00 GMT) as Oxford United head to Preston aiming to leap out of the relegation zone.

The second-bottom U's have been in the bottom three for all but three days since early December, but last Saturday's 2-1 win over West Brom means another three points at North End would see them leapfrog Leicester and Albion, dragging the Baggies into the drop-zone on goal difference ahead of Saturday's matches.

The Lilywhites lost 2-0 at home to Millwall on Saturday and have dropped eight points below the play-off places of the back of a run of one win in nine league games, which have earned them just six points and leaves them 11th, with the prospect of dropping into the bottom half for the first time this season if results don't go their way.

• Preston North End are looking to complete only their second ever league double over Oxford United, doing so in the 1999/00 campaign.

• Oxford have won one of their past five league games against Preston (D1 L3), a 3-1 home win in August 2024 under Des Buckingham.

• Preston have lost three home Championship matches in 2026 so far (W2 D1), only one fewer than they lost throughout the entirety of 2025 at Deepdale (W7 D11 L4).

• Oxford United won their most recent league game, beating West Bromwich Albion 2-1, but they haven't had consecutive Championship wins since January 2025 – the second win of which was against Luton Town, then managed by Matt Bloomfield.

• Jamie Donley has been involved in eight goals in his past 10 EFL starts (2 goals, 6 assists), assisting on his first start for Oxford in their 2-1 win over West Brom last time out.

Preston boss Paul Heckingbottom said his team worked hard but lost to a superior team after Millwall took the three points at Deepdale.

Heckingbottom told BBC Radio Lancashire: "The better team won in terms of chances created so I've got no complaints about the result.

"I've got no complaints with how we applied ourselves as well - we competed, went to the wire and fought really hard.

"The game had no surprises, they're a very difficult team to play against. Arguably, they do the basics better than anyone else in this league.

"Their experienced players know what their strengths are and they play to those strengths."