Ryan Lowe emphasises the boost of PNE's two completed signings so far

PNE have boosted their midfield with signings from Leeds United and Silkeborg

Strengthening his midfield was a priority for Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe this summer.

Ryan Lowe with Ben Whiteman | CameraSport - Andrew Kearns

placeholder image — Ryan Lowe with Ben Whiteman | CameraSport - Andrew Kearns

The Lilywhites lost captain Alan Browne upon the expiry of his contract, along with academy graduate Lewis Leigh. In addition, Ben Woodburn was released. Gaps were left to fill in the engine room and in early July, the arrivals of Sam Greenwood and Stefan Thordarson were confirmed.

Towards the back end of last season, PNE’s midfield was hit by injury and North End were down to the bare bones for some tough matches. That stuck with Lowe, and he was therefore determined to ensure Preston didn’t end up in a similar situation again.

“Definitely, yeah,” said Lowe, on having lots of options. “And that is what you need. So, if you look at our midfield last season, we sort of fell short a little bit. No disrespect to Noah (Mawene) - he is a young kid, who came in, made his debut and did reasonably well. Jack Whatmough is a footballing centre-half, who ended up playing in midfield - and he did well for us.

“That is not a natural position for him, so we just needed to fulfill those bases in case anything like that happened to us again. In that, we can change to two fours, two eights, one four, two tens, so there is a little bit of a mixture in there which we can look at. It is good. The recruitment team have been really busy in terms of trying to find players who can help us be better.

“I think Sam can bring goals and assists to the team and I think Stefan can bring goals and assists to the team. It doesn’t matter where they are from. We’ve obviously got Emil (Riis) and Mads (Frokjaer), who are well laid back lads and like to be coached and talked through. Stefan now is the same and Milly has come back speaking a bit more scouse than English!

“That’s because of me and Marshy, but it’s good that he’s learning the language more and getting better. So yeah, look, what we can’t do is come away from who we are as Preston North End - which is always having that real British/English setting. Now we have got a few foreign players, which will be beneficial for us because they are good players.”