Preston North End player column: Scott Sinclair on the birth of his son being the best birthday present

There was a new arrival in our family last week, my son Charlie born on my 32nd birthday.
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What a super birthday present he was for me, although I guess in future years Charlie’s birthday will get precedence over mine!

He was a couple of days late arriving and the closer we got to March 25, the greater the chance became of us sharing birthdays.

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It’s our third child, we have two girls who were very excited to meet their little brother.

Scott Sinclair celebrates scoring for Preston North End against HuddersfieldScott Sinclair celebrates scoring for Preston North End against Huddersfield
Scott Sinclair celebrates scoring for Preston North End against Huddersfield

My youngest daughter is intrigued by him, she thinks he is like a little dolly and is trying to help with looking after Charlie.

He’s been sleeping quite well which is good news for us and long may that continue.

Charlie’s arrival was well timed in that he came into the world during the international break.

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We had a couple of days off scheduled with having no match, so it allowed me to spend some brilliant time with the family before coming back to training.

Obviously we are entering a key stage of the season now and it is essential we start picking up some points.

We’ve got eight big games ahead and all the players know how important the next few weeks are.

Since we played our last game, there’s been a big change here with Alex Neil leaving the club.

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It was really sad to see him go because he’d been here for a long time and a lot of us signed for Preston when he was the manager.

A change of manager has been quite unusual here, Preston have been a very stable club in those terms over the last few years.

Frankie McAvoy is now interim head coach and we are right behind him.

We are familiar with him and how he works.

In training, Frankie has been putting his stamp on things, any coach is going to do things a little bit differently because no one is exactly the same.

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Frankie is here to help us, he wants to get us back winning points and all the training has been geared that way.

We do have some tough matches coming up, with Norwich, Swansea and Brentford being the first three. Our record against the teams higher in the table is actually quite good.

Earlier in the season we drew 2-2 at Norwich and beat Brentford 4-2.

Against Norwich at their place in September, I scored a penalty and Darnell Fisher found the net. I think we were five minutes away from winning it before Norwich got their second equaliser.

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We came off the pitch disappointed that we hadn’t won it, knowing we were so close to three points.

After Norwich, we go to Swansea on Easter Monday.

Swansea is a club which has a big place in my heart and I’ve so many fond memories of.

I enjoyed my two seasons there and the big moment was scoring a hat-trick in the play-off final which took us to the Premier League.

It is absolutely crazy to think that was 10 years ago – how time flies.

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Swansea had such a good squad that season and in Brendan Rodgers we had such a talented coach.

Brendan has done so well for himself since then, what a career he’s had.

Scott Sinclair was talking to Dave Seddon

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