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Preston North End v Nottingham Forest - Match Preview

Preston North End v Nottingham Forest - Match Preview

In-form Preston North End continued their ascent up the Championship league table with a convincing 3-1 home win over automatic promotion candidates Norwich City during the week with Preston manager, Alex Neil, scoring one against his former club.

That victory over Norwich extended Preston’s unbeaten run to six matches which has seen them climb away from the lower reaches of the Championship and up into the relative safety of 13th place.

Preston NE have a great opportunity to grab another three points at Deepdale again on Saturday afternoon when they entertain an inconsistent Nottingham Forest outfit, and having won four of their last five in the second tier with wins against QPR, Stoke City, Bolton Wanderers and most impressive of all, Norwich City, Alex Neil’s side won’t fear anyone on home turf at the moment.

The hosts have lost on just three occasions so far this season and they’re unbeaten in their last four matches at Deepdale with the win over Norwich following three draws on the trot with Aston Villa, Swansea City and Derby County, 1-1, 1-1 and 0-0 respectively.

The draw has featured prominently in Preston’s home matches to date as 7 of their 16 matches played have resulted in stalemate.

Nottingham Forest followed up their 2-1 home win over Brentford on the weekend with a point away at West Brom in a 2-2 draw which incidentally became Nottingham Forest’s ninth draw away from home this season, which is tied with Stoke City for the highest number of away draws in the Championship to date.

Forest manager, Martin O’Neill is still looking for greater consistency from his squad after he replaced former boss Aitor Karanka, with his side producing mixed returns so far; wins over Wigan Athletic and Brentford have been offset by defeats to Bristol City and Birmingham City.

The visitors also make their way up to Preston without an away win since the end of November when they scored a 2-0 win at Hull City, but since then, the Tricky Trees have been anything but as they’ve lost at Millwall, Reading and Birmingham City and have drawn the other four matches.

The statistics suggest that these two teams could be headed for a share of the spoils on Saturday afternoon as between them, they’ve been involved in 16 draws out of a total of 32 matches (16 home matches, 16 away matches), as well as 3 of the last 7 meetings between these two sides ending in stalemate.

Championship Regular Season
OVERALL TABLE PTS GP W D L +/-
1
Leicester City 94 44 30 4 10 47
2
Leeds United 90 44 27 9 8 43
3
Ipswich Town 89 43 26 11 6 32
4
Southampton 84 44 25 9 10 24
5
West Bromwich 72 44 20 12 12 23
6
Norwich City 72 44 21 9 14 16
7
Hull City 69 44 19 12 13 9
8
Coventry City 63 43 17 12 14 13
9
Middlesbrough 63 44 18 9 17 4
10
Preston North End 63 44 18 9 17 -5
11
Cardiff City 62 44 19 5 20 -11
12
Bristol City 59 44 16 11 17 4
13
Sunderland 56 44 16 8 20 1
14
Swansea City 56 44 15 11 18 -5
15
Watford 53 44 12 17 15 1
16
Millwall 53 44 14 11 19 -12
17
Stoke City 50 44 13 11 20 -16
18
QPR 50 44 13 11 20 -16
19
Blackburn Rovers 49 44 13 10 21 -16
20
Plymouth Argyle 48 44 12 12 20 -11
21
Sheffield Wednesday 47 44 13 8 23 -29
22
Birmingham City 46 44 12 10 22 -16
23
Huddersfield 44 44 9 17 18 -27
24
Rotherham 24 44 4 12 28 -53

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