Selling best players means we could be heading for a relegation scrap, says Preston supporter John Smith

However, I did not expect the soul-destroying trouncing which made Saturday a very sorry day for the PNE faithful.

In the now familiar sterile atmosphere of games without fans, the home side managed to find an alternative 12th man in the form of a referee who gave them a hefty leg up the ladder towards three points by awarding them a penalty in the game’s first attack.

Pundit Roy Keane once said “sometimes you wander do referees understand the game of football?” and this is exactly how I felt after this dubious decision for an offence nobody else on the pitch appeared to see.After the early setback we had our fair share of possession in the rest of the half without creating any clear cut chances.

Whatever Alex Neil said at the interval went straight out of the window when some poor defending led to the home side doubling their advantage in the opening minute of the second half.

The solids then really hit the air conditioning when after missing two penalties we conceded two further goals both of which could have been classified as textbook in the “Carry On Defending” manual.

Had our fans been present the comic fourth goal would have been the cue for the majority of them to head for the exit door. We have now lost four out of our last five games and are closer to the bottom three than the play offs.

Apart from the two goals scored in last week’s victory at Blackburn we have now only scored twice in the other eight league games played since the New Year. This is simply not good enough and we appear to have lost our way in this division over the last 12 months.

If things don't change we will soon be getting sucked into a relegation battle which is all you can really expect if you constantly weaken your team and never strengthen it by investing in quality replacements.