Preston striker Jordan Hugill 'not in right frame of mind' to feature against Nottingham Forest

The striker is the subject of interest from Crystal Palace ahead of the transfer window shutting on Wednesday night.

Things progressed at pace on Tuesday with a decision taken to remove Hugill from the match-day squad at the City Ground, North End going on to win 3-0.

“There’s interest from a team in the Premier League and as of now we have rejected any offer that has made,” Neil said.

“When you’ve got good players, teams are naturally interested in them.

“Jordan’s exclusion was the fact any player that’s going to take the field for Preston North End while I’m here needs to make sure they are completely focused and are going to work as hard as they possibly can for the team and I didn’t think Jordan was in the right frame of mind so I withdrew him from the squad.

“It was that simple.

“Jordan came to the game, he watched the game from the stand.

“I had a chat with him this afternoon and told him I was removing him from the team because I didn’t think his mind would be on the game as much as we need it to be.”

On the field PNE bounced back from disappointing displays against Birmingham and Sheffield United with a convincing win at the City Ground, Billy Bodin, Tom Barkhuizen and Daniel Johnson on target.

“The last two performances haven’t been great but I thought tonight was a perfect response to those two games,” said Neil.

“The lads will rightly go home pleased with how they’ve played tonight and hopefully take that confidence into the next game.”