Who would have thought in pre-season that this fixture would be seventh against ninth?
Preston had enjoyed a relatively comfortable decade in The Championship since their promotion under Simon Grayson in 2015 but last season they only avoided relegation on the final day. They secured their status by claiming an impressive 2-2 draw at sixth place Bristol City while a Luton team including Kaminski, Bell and Burke lost 3-5 at West Brom.
They stuck by their manager Paul Heckingbottom and he has made a lot of changes to the playing squad, notably exploiting the Premier League loan market. Alfie Devine (Tottenham), Lewis Dobbin (Villa), Daniel Jebbison (Bournemouth) and Harrison Armstrong (Everton) have all been introduced with Dobbin scoring three goals already.
In addition, they have signed much travelled veteran Michael Smith, former Brighton defender Odeluga Offiah (who we saw on loan at Blackpool last season); goalkeeper Daniel Iverson from Leicester to replace Freddy Woodman and, of course, Thierry Small who has stated how pleased he was to feel wanted at Preston. Heckingbottom has started him in every league match so far and he scored his first goal at Hull on Tuesday evening. He is no doubt benefitting from the coaching of Jason Euell who joined the Preston coaching staff this summer. One player we won't be seeing is Patrick Bauer who left for AFC Wimbledon in the last window, although he has yet to make an appearance for them.
They have stuck by their controversial Montenegrin striker Milutin Osmajic who scored both their goals against us in the FA Cup defeat last January and who has three already this term. Fresh from his eight-game ban for biting Blackburn's Owen Beck, he has been charged with aiming racist abuse at Burnley's Hannibal Mejbri. If found guilty he could face a further six game ban but it could still be some time before the case is resolved.
The shake-up in personnel has had the desired effect and, despite a challenging fixture list, Preston have made an impressive start. They will be disappointed at letting slip a two goal lead at Hull on Tuesday but at home they have seen off highly fancied Leicester and Ipswich and they came within a couple of minutes of beating Middlesbrough. Last time out at home they drew 0-0 with Bristol City.
They line up in a 352 similarly to Charlton. As we know only too well, Thierry Small will bomb forward and be used to push his opposition wingback further back. He has operated on both the left and right so far this season and it will be interesting to see if Nathan Jones trusts his outside centre backs to deal with that threat or if the wing back will be expected to sit deeper. North End are solid defensively, ranking 4th in the league for goals conceded per match (per Fotmob) but are distinctly average in more attacking areas. They rank between 15th and 22nd for stats including expected goals, shots on target, big chances created and accurate passes per match.
Nevertheless this will be a really tough challenge for Charlton. We haven't won at Deepdale since 2007 when goals from Zheng Zhi and Luke Varney saw us home 2-0. It would be great to repeat that, but a draw would be a highly respectable result. As Nathan Jones said in the aftermath of the Derby match: “Any point on the road in the Championship is a good point,”
Preston have sent the following guide for away supporters
https://images.gc.prestonnorthendfcservices.co.uk/65888450-907e-11f0-b7e4-71a78d83cade.pdf
Photo by Rhea Spencer-Newell