Ryan Lowe pinpoints three key areas Preston North End improvement has been targeted

Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe has highlighted three key areas the Lilywhites are looking to improve in.

Friday night sees PNE get their 2024/25 campaign under way, against Sheffield United. It’s Lowe’s fourth season at Deepdale and third full one, having made the move from Plymouth Argyle in December 2021.

North End have recorded points tallies of 64. 63 and 63 under him, with finishes of 13th, 12th and 10th. The challenge is to push for a play-off place and North End’s boss feels his team must be better at three things, if they are to give themselves a chance of doing so.

“We’ve been working on stuff, so I’ve said to our data analysts that we wanted to be better at certain things last season,” said Lowe. “One of them is counter-pressing, pressing on the front foot and showing them down one area to try and get the ball off them. Another one is having a bit more possession and the other is creating more chances.

“So, I think that has been evident - we just need to put the chances in the back of the net. The counter-pressing, we are winning the ball back in good areas - and we are staying on the ball a bit more, creating some opportunities by moving the ball quicker. So, yeah, I’ve seen large parts of that and loads of good stuff.

“We just want that to continue now, throughout the Championship campaign. We have had a good six week programme and we’ll finish it off with a lot of tactical stuff. But the lads have been excellent, from start to finish. We’ve got to make sure we are ready for it, to go toe-to-toe with these teams and give it our best shot.”