Simon Grayson is challenging his Preston players to finish this season strongly so they have momentum to take into next term.
North End’s 2-0 win over Stevenage at Deepdale stretched their unbeaten run to a fourth game since the dismissal of Graham Westley.
Grayson has overseen three of those matches, Saturday’s contest his first in front of the home supporters.
The Lilywhites’ first target is to gather enough points to ensure League One safety, and the weekend’s victory helped them open up a seven-point cushion between them and the bottom four.
Beyond that, Grayson has bigger things in mind as he looks to get PNE challenging for promotion.
“We’re going okay and it was nice to get the win under our belts,” said the Preston boss who saw Lee Holmes and Will Hayhurst find the net.
“That’s two clean sheets out of four including John Dreyer’s game against Bournemouth.
“We have to try and get better each time we go out, we are challenging the players to see if they can go on a run from now until the end of the season and remain unbeaten.
“It’s not beyond them – it might be difficult – but we want to finish this season with some really positive momentum ready for next year.
“I will work extremely hard for this club to give them value for money every time my team goes out and performs.
“Hopefully, we can be positive together and try and achieve something.
“It is the reason I came here, if I had gone to another League One club it wouldn’t have matched my ambition.
“But this club can do that.”
North End had the game sewn up early doors, Holmes giving them a sixth-minute lead with a curling shot from the edge of the box.
Then teenager Hayhurst struck 10 minutes later with a close-range volley for his third game in three games.
Such a high-tempo start delighted Grayson, it being something the squad had worked on in training leading up to the game.
Grayson said: “I don’t think I could have asked for too much more really.
“We scored two goals and kept a clean sheet, limiting Stevenage to very few opportunities. We came out of the traps really quickly which we asked the players to do – carry out a plan which we worked on in training on Thursday and Friday.
“We wanted to change play quickly which would hopefully lead to opportunities to score goals.
“In the second half we didn’t play as well as we can do with the ball, but without it we played very well.
“Declan Rudd only had one save to make in something like the 85th minute, I was delighted with the clean sheet.
“I’m sure that Stevenage expected us to come out and play like that, and we didn’t want to disappoint them.
“We wanted to be on the front foot and make sure we got the crowd behind us right from the start.
“I thought we moved the ball around quickly, moved it into good areas and had some good options.
“Getting the goal early was great because it gave us a platform for the rest of the game.
“In the first half we created a lot of chances in addition to the two goals, there were quite a few near-misses.
“Even in the second half there were chances – there was the bobble on to Jack King’s shin which went over.
“It could have been a few more if we had taken the opportunities, but I won’t get too greedy.”
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