What Cardiff City manager Erol Bulut has said about Preston North End
Preston North End travel down to Cardiff City at the weekend and have drew praise from the Bluebirds boss.
Cardiff City manager Erol Bulut has identified Preston North End's key strengths ahead of their clash at the Cardiff City Stadium.
The two sides meet in South Wales on Saturday with both entering the match on the back of wins against a higher calibre of opposition. Cardiff beat in-form Watford last week whilst PNE - despite a late Kieffer Moore brace - held on to win 3-2 against Ipswich Town.
Earlier on in the season, the Bluebirds won 2-1 after a red card and thanks to two stoppage time goals. Milutin Osmajic opened the scoring for Ryan Lowe's side in the 48th minute, but Robbie Brady was dismissed and PNE could not hang on. Karlan Grant scored in the sixth minute of added on time and then Ike Ugbo netted in the ninth additional minute.
PNE are Cardiff's most played opponent in English football, with the two clubs having met a total of 102 times. Cardiff's Turkish boss, Bulut, has picked out what Preston did well in their 101st meeting and what the hosts must do if they are to be successful this weekend.
“Preston is a team that presses high, so they have good speed and physically are a good team," said Bulut to the official club website. "We know from our first game against them how they are, so we have to be good against them, both physically and tactically, which we’ve looked at in training. We have to manage the game when we are leading at home, to keep the ball and try to put the opposing team away from our goal."
Cardiff have a few injury doubts going into the match and one former PNE favourite is likely to miss out. Callum Robinson has been out for the last month and isn't yet ready to return. Mark McGuinness, meanwhile, has a slight problem and that could present an opportunity to Liverpool loanee Nat Phillips - to make his full debut after coming on as a substitute at Vicarage Road.
Republic of Ireland winger Callum O'Dowda has spent the last few months on the sidelines and this match will come too soon for him. Aaron Ramsey is in line to make his first appearance in over four months after recovering from a hamstring injury, whilst Joe Ralls and Perry Ng are both pushing to be a part of the action.