It's all systems go as far as Preston North End new boys are concerned

Preston opted for a 3-5-2 formation and took the lead through left-wing back Greg Cunningham, who received the ball from opposite wing-back Alan Browne.

Liam Lindsay nodded in the Lilywhites’ second before Adam Armstrong quickly replied from the spot, as Preston saw it out for a crucial 2-1 victory.

Having brought in eight new faces last month, Neil has spoken of the need to bed his new men in and said they did well to adapt to the new shape so quickly into their time at the club.

He said: “I sort of contradict myself, because when you’re trying to settle them in you don’t really want to change the shape. I thought for this game we needed to change the shape to give us the best chance of winning.

“For those lads to come in, play one way last week and then have to adapt to play a completely different way this week – playing next to guys that they might not have played with before, like Liam and Jordan Storey – I thought it spoke volumes.

“It probably wasn’t helpful because when you bring players in you want to have a set rhythm of how you want to play, and you want them to get used to it game by game.

“Liam’s now played two games and played two completely different shapes with completely different personnel as well.”

Changing the style is not uncommon at Deepdale, with 39-year-old Neil often opting for different approaches depending on the opposition’s strengths and weaknesses.

The PNE boss feels it was the change of approach that helped get one over on Rovers, returning the favour from earlier on in the campaign when Blackburn won at Deepdale.

He said: “All the best teams do change things, it may not be clear to the naked eye but whether you’re dropping out of one side or dropping in between the lines on the other side, or how you press or whatever.

“There’s always something slightly different. Even Blackburn, they changed how they built in the second half.

“They brought Stewart Downing on, dropped him out between the lines, bumped Tyrhys Dolan up, bumped the full-backs up to make sure we couldn’t get out as a back five and that’s how we had sustained pressure.

“It’s difficult to stop but at the end of the day, we’re winning the game, we don’t need to come out and win the ball back now.

“Tony Mowbray’s very astute tactically and a very good manager at doing that. I thought we did a number on them in getting that right.”

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