Preston North End boss Alex Neil wants another big performance against Nottingham Forest

The Wednesday-Saturday schedule meant they went straight from the 3-1 victory over the Canaries to getting themselves in shape for the visit of Forest to Deepdale.

Lilywhites boss Alex Neil likened it to climbing Mount Everest over and over again, in that the challenges keep on coming.

The first-half performance against Norwich was arguably PNE’s best of the season and the challenge is to follow that up with another good result against Forest.

Neil said: “It always is about trying to back-up a good result by doing it again.

“The thing is with football, regardless of how well you have done and how many wins you’ve had, no one cares, they are just bothered about the next one.

“My job is never ending in that respect, it is like climbing Mount Everest, except that Mount Everest never ends.

“What you do is carry on going and going until you think you’ve reached the peak.

“Then you realise that you need to go there again.

“We’ve only got a short time between games but the good thing is both are at home and it’s not as if we’ve had a long journey from somewhere.

“Yesterday we only had the lads in to make sure there were no injuries.

“It was about recovery, ice baths, stretching, massage, to help them along the way.”

Assuming there was a clean bill of health from Wednesday night, Neil will be tempted to keep the team unchanged.

He has only made one change in the last five games, bringing in Tom Barkhuizen for Jayden Stockley.

North End’s good form, which sees them unbeaten in six games and having won four of the last five, has taken them to within eight points of the top six.

Reaching the play-offs looks a tall order but Neil is of the belief it is not beyond them.

“I think it can be done but we aren’t naive, there are eight points separating us and the top six,” said Neil. “There is still work to be done, we are just hoping we have not left ourselves too much to do.

“It is going to be a difficult and mammoth task for us to get there but if any group of players have the determination, hunger and quality to close the gap over the last 14 games, then it is us.

“This season is far from over. If you look back to last season, Millwall came from nowhere to almost make the play-offs.

“We’d been up and about the play-offs for a lot of the time but Millwall shot up.

“It is a marathon and not a sprint, strong runs can carry you a long way.”