Paul Huntington wants Preston North End team-mates to sign new contracts

A one-year deal extending the central defender’s stay at Deepdale until the summer of 2022 was announced on Monday afternoon.

That will carry him into a 10th season as a PNE player and he’d like some familiar faces to be there with him.

Alan Browne, Ben Davies, Daniel Johnson and Ben Pearson are now just six months away from reaching the end of their contracts.

Offers are on the table for them but to date have remained unsigned.

Huntington is at a different stage of his career than that quartet are, with him able to see both sides of the picture.

“For me, it was an easy decision to sign for another year,” Huntington told the Lancashire Post.

“It was something we had spoken about for a good few weeks and getting it done was a weight off my mind. I can just concentrate on training and playing now.

“As a footballer you’d be lying if you said it wasn’t at the back of your mind going into January and coming out of contract soon.

“We’ve got important players still to commit and hopefully they will decide to stay and sign.

“They are a big part of what we do here, it would be better for us if they stayed.

“I can see both sides of it and I will be trying to get into them now that I’ve signed!

“You want your best players to stay, keep that core group together.

“I know that this club is on a solid footing and that gives me extra security.”

The 2021/22 season will be Huntington’s 10th campaign at PNE but his football focus is very much on the present.

He has clocked-up 295 appearances in a Preston shirt in all competitions, with the Boxing Day victory at Derby being his 250th league game for the club.

Tuesday night's Deepdale clash with Coventry City (7.45pm) should push him closer to the 300-match mark, Huntington featuring a great deal more this season than he did last.

“Last season, particularly in the first half, Patrick Bauer and Ben Davies did ever so well and I couldn’t have any complaints about not getting in,” said the 33-year-old.

“I would have liked to have played more but it is more about the team than myself and I had to wait my turn.

“I’ve been in the team a lot more recently which is good and I always make sure I’m ready when called on.

“It was a big win for us at Derby on Boxing Day and great that Browney scored so late in the day for us.

“Defensively we played well and going forward it was a case of knocking it around, moving Derby around and not going hell for leather at it.

“To be fair to Derby, they played it quite well. In the second half they put the Polish lad Kamil Jozwiak up front running off the striker.

“They were a bit braver than a lot of teams would be but thankfully we came back with three points.

“It was a happy bus journey home because it was a really important result.

“We hadn’t got a very good record there in the league so it was nice to put that particular one to bed.

“Browney’s winner was a good goal, we didn’t force the ball and that went in our favour.

“When Derby kicked-off I was telling the referee it was time to blow up but he let it go on for a few seconds!

“We’ve now got to try and follow it up against Coventry.

“I played against them a few times in the early years here but we’ve not been in the same division for a little while.

“They will play with a back five, get numbers behind the ball and frustrate.

“It is up to us to deal with that and put in a performance to get a good result.

“The schedule at Christmas has not been that bad, nothing like the few weeks before it.

“Up to the Bristol City game it was manic, because of Covid they had crammed the fixtures in.

“At least after beating Bristol City we got a bit of a break and some time on the training ground.

“We’ve got these two home games and then a bit of a break before the FA Cup.”

Christmas for Huntington was a rather quiet one which enabled a 100% focus on the football.

“I spent it down here because my wife was self-isolating back home because of a couple of cases of Covid in the family,” explained Huntington.

“I haven’t been home to Carlisle for a couple of weeks.

“Last week at the training ground we all sat down for a Christmas dinner so I was a bit Christmas -dinnered out by the time it got to Christmas Day. So it was a pretty normal day for me and I just prepared for the Boxing Day game.

“We came in at midday to train on Christmas Day afternoon and then travelled to Derby the next morning.

“These are strange times at the moment with Covid, there seems to be more cases around this time than earlier in the year.

“It is getting a bit closer to home. Hopefully things will start to get better in the weeks ahead and we can all get back to something a bit more normal.”

Thanks for reading. If you value what we do and are able to support us, a digital subscription is just £1 per month for the first two months. Try us today by clicking here