Preston North End's victory over Bradford City pleases Alex Neil and earns them a second-round meeting with Hull City

The reward for the 4-0 win at Valley Parade was a home tie in the second round against Hull City.

Neil changed the full starting XI for the visit to West Yorkshire and saw that pay-off.

Andre Green volleyed North End into a 13th minute lead, Tom Barkhuizen scoring soon after.

Barkhuizen netted again seven minutes into the second half, with Josh Harrop completing the scoring on his return from knee surgery.

Neil said: "We have put two good back-to-back performances together and the really pleasing thing is that it was two different squads.

"It was very good right from the off, we were 2-0 up after 19 minutes.

"I have really tough decisions to make for the weekend now, the lads tonight knew they needed to put themselves in contention and match the good form of the other lads.

"They have made it really difficult for me come the weekend but that is exactly what I asked them to do."

Neil hopes this result, coupled with the 3-0 victory over Wigan, showed the squad had depth in most areas.

He said: "Fans and managers - myself - want you to strengthen your squad as much as possible.

"We did want to do a bit more business but the window shut.

"What we need to do now is put it to bed, focus on the games coming up, focus on the lads we have.

"The lads have displayed in the last two games how much quality we have got in that squad. It is about maintaining that, getting better again, going again, and everyone is fighting for a starting slot.

"The focus of the team talk before the game was to make sure that once the game is done, I'm thinking who to pick for the next one because we had so many good performances.

"That is what we delivered. Our following tonight for a cup game on a Tuesday was fantastic and the players really fed off that.

"All in all, we went from a really negative time last week to a really positive week so far.

"Hopefully come Saturday we can continue that."