Dave Seddon’s Preston North End Press View: Away form key to reaching Premier League

It began to get better over Christmas and has moved through the gears over the last three weeks.

As the Lilywhites prepare for back-to-back matches at Deepdale, they can reflect on a job well done on the road.

Six unbeaten and three wins on the bounce is the record going back to December.

At last the away record is starting to resemble that of a side in the promotion frame.

For a while it was very much the poor relation compared to what North End had been doing at Deepdale.

Now it is 20 points taken on the road, five wins and five draws.

It is still not as good as the five teams above them.

Then again, no team in the Championship can better PNE’s home record so there is the trade-off.

They lost three away games on the bounce in the second half of November and early December.

Derby, Hull and Queens Park Rangers beat them, the Hull game the low-water mark of that run.

Then the recovery started with a goalless draw at Cardiff on December 21, a game they should have won.

North End were within a few minutes of victory against Leeds at Elland Road on Boxing Day before having to settle for a 1-1 draw.

The performance in the 1-1 derby draw at Blackburn was nothing to write home about at the time. However with hindsight it delivered a bit of stability after losing two home league games and the FA Cup clash with Norwich on home turf.

Since then have come the wins on the road at Barnsley, Wigan and, latterly, Stoke on Wednesday night.

All were achieved in a different way, Barnsley were played at their own game and formation – and schooled in it.

Wigan were sliced open with quick, incisive passing and then had their attacking play rebuffed by resolute defending.

For 45 minutes at Stoke, North End weren’t really at it, relying on a Ben Davies master class and some good goalkeeping from Declan Rudd to stay in it.

They then flipped over from trying to pass the ball around nicely to putting it forward earlier than they had been doing.

Two goals – the first from a corner, the second in the aftermath of one – brought the three points home to Lancashire.

With two tough-looking away encounters to come before the end of the month at West Bromwich Albion and Fulham, this run of wins on the road has been timely.

It goes without saying that North End will have got a shot of confidence from them.

They will be saying to themselves why can’t they go to The Hawthorns and Craven Cottage and get something?

With money in the bank, so to speak, from the wins at Barnsley, Wigan and Stoke, draws wouldn’t be disastrous in the Midlands and London.

Let’s not get too far ahead, though, Millwall and then Hull come here this Saturday and next, there being a pressure and expectation on those two matches.

Back to Stoke and it might not have been a game for the purist but it had plenty going on to get us talking.

There was Alan Browne being taken out by Darnell Fisher (when aiming for James McClean) but making a sufficiently swift recovery to open the scoring with his injured leg.

Then Tom Barkhuizen kept up his scoring streak to make it 2-0, his 11th goal of the season and fourth in the last four games.

In between was the spat between Ben Pearson and McClean, a pair who according to first goalscorer Browne had ‘history’.

Two fiery characters who opposition fans love to hate, I suppose some sort of clash was inevitable.

Why the need for McClean to barge into Pearson off a run-up, I don’t really know.

Clearly it was that ‘history’ coming to a head, Pearson not backward in coming forward when going to remonstrate with the Republic of Ireland winger.

One thing which the Stoke game showed was how a bit of experience doesn’t go amiss.

North End are generally regarded as a young side, yet the two substitutes used by Alex Neil were David Nugent and Paul Gallagher – 34 and 35 respectively.

Both influenced the game, Nugent in making sure the ball stuck up front a lot more and Gallagher setting up the second goal within a short time of coming on.

With 32-year-old Tom Clarke on the bench too, Neil wasn’t short of experience to call on.

Sticking with the away theme, what a tremendous effort from the PNE fans to already have sold out their 1,941 allocation for the trip to Fulham on February 29.

London away games are always an attraction, two hours by train and chance for a good day out in the capital’s watering holes.

Talking of water, two boats will ferry a few hundred PNE fans down the Thames to Craven Cottage.

Not quite land and sea but a river trip all the same sounds fun.