Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe expects plenty of risk from Swansea City

A few yards along from Lowe in the technical area at the Liberty Stadium will be Russell Martin who landed the Swansea head coach job on the eve of the season.

Like Lowe, Martin stepped up from League One to take the position, having been in charge at MK Dons.

The North End boss sees his and Martin’s style as similar to a point, the amount of risk being the difference.

Addressing what he expects from Swansea, Lowe said: “It is a good way they play, an exciting way, a football way.

“It is one we will respect, we play the same style but maybe not as risky as they play.

“That is Russell’s style and the way he wants to go about his business. We are looking forward to a good game of football.

“It’s risk and reward, do you risk the ball in certain areas?

“I have certain areas where you can take a risk and certain areas where you can’t – I won’t give those away.

“Russell has put his stamp on the style of play down there, he has some good footballers.

“We have to make sure we go there and concentrate on us, we will respect Swansea for what they are but we won’t just fear them.

“Our focus is 80% on us and 20% on them, that is how I approach every game.

“Hopefully we will put in a good performance down there and bring something back.”

PNE were 3-1 winners against Swansea at Deepdale in August, Sepp van den Berg, Emil Riis and Ben Whiteman with the goals.

The Welsh side weren’t afraid to play out from the back that afternoon and there were times North End caught them out.

Building from the back is something Lowe had introduced at Preston but as he points out, with a bit less risk than Swansea do.

Martin’s men are 17th in the table at present, five points behind the Lilywhites.

Like most clubs they saw their Christmas programme hit by Covid postponements, with almost a month’s gap.

After losing 4-1 at home to Nottingham Forest on December 11, Swansea didn’t play again until January 8 when they were beaten 3-2 by Southampton in the FA Cup.

Last Saturday, they drew 1-1 at Huddersfield with Flynn Downes scoring their 78th-minute equaliser.

Their leading goalscorer is Joel Piroe who has scored 13 times this season, 11 of those coming in the Championship.

The Dutch striker, 22, who was signed for £1m in June from PSV Eindhoven, scored in the reverse fixture at Deepdale to give Swansea the lead, an advantage quickly cancelled out by PNE.

Behind Piroe in the scoring stakes is Jamie Paterson with eight league goals.

He didn’t feature in last week’s game at Huddersfield due to an issue behind the scenes with his contract.

An extension was triggered recently by the amount of games he had played but he is reportedly not happy.

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