Preston North End boss Ryan Lowe sends clear message to Daniel Johnson and discusses squad depth

After nine years at Deepdale, Johnson might have played his final game at Deepdale as his contract is due to expire this summer and he is yet to agree to a new deal.

PNE’s no.10 has spent nine years at Deepdale, playing over 300 times and has firmly cemented himself as a modern legend with his service in PR1.

Lowe has made it clear that he would like his vice-captain to remain at the club beyond the summer but admits that it is no longer down to the club.

"We've said to DJ that we'd love to keep him. It'll be down to him,” Lowe said. “He's been a fantastic servant to the football club and I'd love nothing better than to see him commit his future to the football club and see out his 10 years and have a testimonial and so on and so forth. That decision will be down to what he chooses to do as well.”

North End are looking to keep five of their six out of contract players this summer, only Matthew Olosunde allowed to leave without a contract offer. Johnson, Greg Cunningham, Robbie Brady and Josh Onomah are all in negotiations with the club, with Ben Woodburn’s contract extended by another season.

But when it comes to depth, Lowe acknowledges that his side fell short in that regard but rather than looking for extra personnel to ease that burden, he’s looking more on the injury front.

He said: “We've fallen short with depth this year. When you look at it, we lost Ched Evans when we were in good form, we lost Greg when we were in good form, we lost our captain Alan Browne when we were in good form, Emil Riis too.

"There's four players straight away that if they stayed fit and you kept them fit, the squad depth would be fine. I don't want a big squad because we have the youth team lads and the young pros to fulfill that like we had against Sunderland.

"In terms of the injuries, maybe it's something that we can look at further down the line at injury prevention or something like that, rather than getting 30 players. I definitely don't want 30 players.”