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POST-MATCH THREAD: Preston North End v Charlton Athletic: Saturday 4th October 2025: KO 15:00

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Comments

  • gringo said:
    It's not that long ago that we worried that some club would come in and nick Leaburn off us. I think at the moment we would struggle to give him away. He doesn't seem to have pushed on (perhaps his injury has affected him longer term) but It seems there is something missing at the moment.
    The thing that is missing affecting Leaburns game is service!!!
    He does look markedly slower than before his injury. Maybe I just have a poor memory but used to think he had a decent 5-10 yard sprint. 
    He's never been that good. Just like his old man. Split opinions although there were/are more for than against. At least his old man could attack the ball in the air (oh yes I forgot, he did get his head to a ball to flick onto Knibbs that set up our winner at Bramall Lane 🙄)

    I'd start with Oloafe & Kelman for the next few games. Try that pairing & see how we fare.
    According to Fotmob Leaburn has won 37 aerial duels this season, which puts him ahead of 92.7% of players in his position. But yeah, if you ignore that and the goal he created then he never wins anything, you're right.
    Out of curiosity,  what is the definition of winning an aerial duel here? Is it simply getting the header in before the opposition player regardless of where it goes, or is it winning the aerial duel AND the ball falling nicely and intentionally for a teammate?

    Also, this 92.7% below: how many duels on the ground have they won? How do they compare?

    Statistics can be twisted to suit an argument.

    By the way, Leaburn senior never ’attacked’ the ball in the air until the 91-92 season. 
    Fotmob get their data from Opta, who define an aerial duel as 'where two players challenge in the air against each other. The player that wins the ball is deemed to have won the duel. When more than two players are involved the player closest to the duel winner is given an Aerial Duel lost'. So no, nothing about it also falling beautifully at a teammate's feet but then that's a different stat. 
    Miles has won 49 duels apparently, better than 83.6% of others in his position but even with the definition it's not clear what exactly a duel is; they say any 50:50 contest but he's also only won 3 tackles so it's evidently a very broad category and not really that useful except to show he's quite strong. He has won possession in the final third 9 times though, which is above 94.5% of others.

    Statistics can be twisted to suit an argument sure but these have just been presented as they are on the stats page, and they're presented in response to that claim that Leaburn can't attack the ball in the air, which is provably untrue and a silly thing to say; just goes to show that football fans see what they want to see a lot of the time, not what's actually happening. 
  • Just seen the usual 2 min highlights reel. All Preston. Not a single "highlight" from us. How can you play 90 mins of football & not have anything to show for it.
    Granted not many, but the 2 min highlight reel from the club has two attacking moments from us. 
  • Just seen the usual 2 min highlights reel. All Preston. Not a single "highlight" from us. How can you play 90 mins of football & not have anything to show for it.
    We lost... I see it as it doesnt really matter if we had anything to show for it...

    Same with the "Shots on Target" obsession at times from some on here. If we had a shot on target vs. Preston it would have been nothing more than a wasted opportunity, given the score line for us would still have read "nil"
  • mcgrandall
    edited 10:44AM
    Just seen the usual 2 min highlights reel. All Preston. Not a single "highlight" from us. How can you play 90 mins of football & not have anything to show for it.
    We lost... I see it as it doesnt really matter if we had anything to show for it...

    Same with the "Shots on Target" obsession at times from some on here. If we had a shot on target vs. Preston it would have been nothing more than a wasted opportunity, given the score line for us would still have read "nil"
    I was at the game yesterday, and I would argue it does. Preston were a very organised team, and they didn't allow us to have anything to show for it. They didn't allow us to settle on the ball the entire match and continually broke through our lines.

    They did to us what we did to a lot of teams last year. To me it was a good indication of where we are in the league and how we need to improve as if we want to move forward. 

    Quite liked Deepdale, and was nice to see an IPA on draft. 
  • Just seen the usual 2 min highlights reel. All Preston. Not a single "highlight" from us. How can you play 90 mins of football & not have anything to show for it.
    To be fair we had a couple of decent chances - both TC and later Leaburn failed to connect with crosses for easy tap ins. 
  • th0rryy said:
    5 defenders and 2 defensive minded midfielders is excessive and not always necessary.

    I would like to see a 433/4231 against Wednesday. TC/Kelman/Apter up top with Carey behind them. Give Apter and TC more freedom out wide and let them do what they do best. 

    2nd lowest for succesful dribbles when we have two talented wingers just seems a waste.
    I agree this system would get a lot more out us going forward, but NJ is absolutely wedded to 3 CBs at the back and this won't change.

    There were many, many times last season that I thought we were going to do this, and we never did. At best, we were doing this in an with/without possession system. Although the combination of Edwards/Gillesphey/Jones/Ramsay/Small was supposedly a 5 at the back, the times that you actually saw Small play as RWB rather than RW was generally rare. We ended up, when we had the ball and being positive, being closer to 4 at the back. Ramsay was strong at those 1v1s to cover for that. Even then, in games that we were chasing, it still felt like we had a spare CB at the back.

    This season, he employed Apter in the Small role, but with the introduction of Bree, he is seen as bringing more quality in both the role and at set pieces. Apter hasn't really done much wrong, but he's even more of an out-and-out winger than Small was. At least Small could defend a bit, whereas Apter is a little out of his depth when being asked to defend. With us being more on the back foot in more games, we're concentrating a lot more about being without possession and that's where we are a lot more defensive. Coventry and Docherty are both naturally defensive and the whole shape is about keeping clean sheets and effectively parking the bus, particularly away from home.

    Unless NJ rips up the playbook, we won't revert to a flat back 4 and only 2 CBs - only in very particular situations has he done that. I really like the idea of Kelman with Apter/TC on either side, Carey/Knibbs behind and then a block of 6 behind. I absolutely agree that this is the best use of the players we have - having two wingers, either side, to get truly wide and feed low, hard crosses / run at defenders. Then when we get ahead, that's when we revert to the 3 at the back if required. The first goal is SO IMPORTANT in this league, and we're rarely ones to chase it early on. Equally, you can look at it glass half-full and say we absolutely can't concede the first - but why not be proactive, rather than reactive. Ultimately, I'm just a casual fan and not a manager - NJ knows infinitely more about his team, players and tactics, but as a layman, it feels we're not making the best of the attacking players we have.

    I do feel that in a parallel universe, another manager would deploy our players in this way. NJ is smart and will continue to grind out results and make it very difficult for teams to play against us. I'd love us to play without the shackles of 3 CBs at times, but there's a bigger picture of not going too cavalier and ending up being on the wrong side of a result more often than not.

    It is just the way our manager wants us to play.
    Bree could play RCB with Apter ahead of him. Not many games where we’d get away with doing it but Sheff Weds at home is probably one of them. Can’t see us changing much though, and what we are doing has worked so far 
  • I just don’t understand how multiple people thought Kelman had a good game
    cos we're all desperate for him to do well,  so if he has one good touch it's amazing and he's come good.
    Fans are , understandably, reluctant to say we're a bit devoid of any decent attacking threat which is exactly what we are , proper lame up front 
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  • gringo said:
    It's not that long ago that we worried that some club would come in and nick Leaburn off us. I think at the moment we would struggle to give him away. He doesn't seem to have pushed on (perhaps his injury has affected him longer term) but It seems there is something missing at the moment.
    The thing that is missing affecting Leaburns game is service!!!
    He does look markedly slower than before his injury. Maybe I just have a poor memory but used to think he had a decent 5-10 yard sprint. 
    He's never been that good. Just like his old man. Split opinions although there were/are more for than against. At least his old man could attack the ball in the air (oh yes I forgot, he did get his head to a ball to flick onto Knibbs that set up our winner at Bramall Lane 🙄)

    I'd start with Oloafe & Kelman for the next few games. Try that pairing & see how we fare.
    According to Fotmob Leaburn has won 37 aerial duels this season, which puts him ahead of 92.7% of players in his position. But yeah, if you ignore that and the goal he created then he never wins anything, you're right.
    Out of curiosity,  what is the definition of winning an aerial duel here? Is it simply getting the header in before the opposition player regardless of where it goes, or is it winning the aerial duel AND the ball falling nicely and intentionally for a teammate?

    Also, this 92.7% below: how many duels on the ground have they won? How do they compare?

    Statistics can be twisted to suit an argument.

    By the way, Leaburn senior never ’attacked’ the ball in the air until the 91-92 season. 
    Fotmob get their data from Opta, who define an aerial duel as 'where two players challenge in the air against each other. The player that wins the ball is deemed to have won the duel. When more than two players are involved the player closest to the duel winner is given an Aerial Duel lost'. So no, nothing about it also falling beautifully at a teammate's feet but then that's a different stat. 
    Miles has won 49 duels apparently, better than 83.6% of others in his position but even with the definition it's not clear what exactly a duel is; they say any 50:50 contest but he's also only won 3 tackles so it's evidently a very broad category and not really that useful except to show he's quite strong. He has won possession in the final third 9 times though, which is above 94.5% of others.

    Statistics can be twisted to suit an argument sure but these have just been presented as they are on the stats page, and they're presented in response to that claim that Leaburn can't attack the ball in the air, which is provably untrue and a silly thing to say; just goes to show that football fans see what they want to see a lot of the time, not what's actually happening. 
    6'7" lad in "wins Ariel duels" shocker.

    Next thing you'll know people will be telling us Kaminski has saved more shots than anyone else in our starting XI....
  • Our plan up front seems to be anything but having shots or creating chances yesterday. Preston were the worst type of team for us to play as they are like us in terms of game plan and yesterday they were better at it than us. The conundrum for NJ is he somehow needs to find a way to instill some confidence into our strikers, 9 games and no goals is not good enough. Also the last 2 games worryingly our game changers haven’t been. Certainly not panicking atm and I’m sure we will see the same tactics against Wednesday but anything but 3 points I think NJ needs to start thinking about his options up front
  • gringo said:
    It's not that long ago that we worried that some club would come in and nick Leaburn off us. I think at the moment we would struggle to give him away. He doesn't seem to have pushed on (perhaps his injury has affected him longer term) but It seems there is something missing at the moment.
    The thing that is missing affecting Leaburns game is service!!!
    He does look markedly slower than before his injury. Maybe I just have a poor memory but used to think he had a decent 5-10 yard sprint. 
    He's never been that good. Just like his old man. Split opinions although there were/are more for than against. At least his old man could attack the ball in the air (oh yes I forgot, he did get his head to a ball to flick onto Knibbs that set up our winner at Bramall Lane 🙄)

    I'd start with Oloafe & Kelman for the next few games. Try that pairing & see how we fare.
    According to Fotmob Leaburn has won 37 aerial duels this season, which puts him ahead of 92.7% of players in his position. But yeah, if you ignore that and the goal he created then he never wins anything, you're right.
    Out of curiosity,  what is the definition of winning an aerial duel here? Is it simply getting the header in before the opposition player regardless of where it goes, or is it winning the aerial duel AND the ball falling nicely and intentionally for a teammate?

    Also, this 92.7% below: how many duels on the ground have they won? How do they compare?

    Statistics can be twisted to suit an argument.

    By the way, Leaburn senior never ’attacked’ the ball in the air until the 91-92 season. 
    Fotmob get their data from Opta, who define an aerial duel as 'where two players challenge in the air against each other. The player that wins the ball is deemed to have won the duel. When more than two players are involved the player closest to the duel winner is given an Aerial Duel lost'. So no, nothing about it also falling beautifully at a teammate's feet but then that's a different stat. 
    Miles has won 49 duels apparently, better than 83.6% of others in his position but even with the definition it's not clear what exactly a duel is; they say any 50:50 contest but he's also only won 3 tackles so it's evidently a very broad category and not really that useful except to show he's quite strong. He has won possession in the final third 9 times though, which is above 94.5% of others.

    Statistics can be twisted to suit an argument sure but these have just been presented as they are on the stats page, and they're presented in response to that claim that Leaburn can't attack the ball in the air, which is provably untrue and a silly thing to say; just goes to show that football fans see what they want to see a lot of the time, not what's actually happening. 
    Well, that’s interesting because maybe these fans don’t necessarily ’see what they want to see.’ Maybe if a player ’wins an aerial duel’ but the ball goes back into a 50/50 situation at best, some fans consider it the same as the player not having contributed anything. 
    It’s a question of two minds interpretating what is seen in different ways.
    This finally helps me to understand why opinions on Leaburn snr were so divided. His so much lauded ’hold-up play’ was valued in quite contrasting amounts by different sections of our support.
  • We will get beaten in this league we just have to accept that. Every team in this league are decent  teams I don’t see any weaknesses from any team. Appreciate you will get probably have the three that come down in the mix at the top and probably another 5 or 6 others that will be there around  the top. Finishing fourth from bottom will be a ok it’s all about survival this season and we will I’m sure have some good highs during the season, and yes our share of lows. 
    Should have got Kone when he was available he was a real handful when we played QPR. I’m hoping the forward line will click at some stage I’m hoping for it to work. Give all the players a chance I’m sure it will work out. COYR. 
  • Simonsen said:
    Croydon said:
    Can we send TC and Leaburn down the gym, they both get brushed off the ball so easily. If they could just hold their ground more they would be a real threat.
    I can't work out if Leaburn is weak as piss or just loves to play act, because for a big lump he is always going down so easily
    Just a typical modern forward. Looking for free kicks and cards rather than relishing the battle. As he matures, the penny might drop.


    Perhaps the result of being coached by Danny “dark arts” Hylton? 
  • Was there. Disappointed but not too sad at a top 6 side. The problem ,like the start ,of last season is the final finish and chances created. No shots on target is the main stat.
  • andipandi said:
    Crap defending for the Small goal
    Even worse for the second goal
    They were much better than us.
  • Just seen the usual 2 min highlights reel. All Preston. Not a single "highlight" from us. How can you play 90 mins of football & not have anything to show for it.
    We lost... I see it as it doesnt really matter if we had anything to show for it...

    Same with the "Shots on Target" obsession at times from some on here. If we had a shot on target vs. Preston it would have been nothing more than a wasted opportunity, given the score line for us would still have read "nil"
    I was at the game yesterday, and I would argue it does. Preston were a very organised team, and they didn't allow us to have anything to show for it. They didn't allow us to settle on the ball the entire match and continually broke through our lines.

    They did to us what we did to a lot of teams last year. To me it was a good indication of where we are in the league and how we need to improve as if we want to move forward. 

    Quite liked Deepdale, and was nice to see an IPA on draft. 
    Preston are harder opponents for us than more talented but "flakier" sides, that we can outwork.
  • th0rryy said:
    5 defenders and 2 defensive minded midfielders is excessive and not always necessary.

    I would like to see a 433/4231 against Wednesday. TC/Kelman/Apter up top with Carey behind them. Give Apter and TC more freedom out wide and let them do what they do best. 

    2nd lowest for succesful dribbles when we have two talented wingers just seems a waste.
    I agree this system would get a lot more out us going forward, but NJ is absolutely wedded to 3 CBs at the back and this won't change.

    There were many, many times last season that I thought we were going to do this, and we never did. At best, we were doing this in an with/without possession system. Although the combination of Edwards/Gillesphey/Jones/Ramsay/Small was supposedly a 5 at the back, the times that you actually saw Small play as RWB rather than RW was generally rare. We ended up, when we had the ball and being positive, being closer to 4 at the back. Ramsay was strong at those 1v1s to cover for that. Even then, in games that we were chasing, it still felt like we had a spare CB at the back.

    This season, he employed Apter in the Small role, but with the introduction of Bree, he is seen as bringing more quality in both the role and at set pieces. Apter hasn't really done much wrong, but he's even more of an out-and-out winger than Small was. At least Small could defend a bit, whereas Apter is a little out of his depth when being asked to defend. With us being more on the back foot in more games, we're concentrating a lot more about being without possession and that's where we are a lot more defensive. Coventry and Docherty are both naturally defensive and the whole shape is about keeping clean sheets and effectively parking the bus, particularly away from home.

    Unless NJ rips up the playbook, we won't revert to a flat back 4 and only 2 CBs - only in very particular situations has he done that. I really like the idea of Kelman with Apter/TC on either side, Carey/Knibbs behind and then a block of 6 behind. I absolutely agree that this is the best use of the players we have - having two wingers, either side, to get truly wide and feed low, hard crosses / run at defenders. Then when we get ahead, that's when we revert to the 3 at the back if required. The first goal is SO IMPORTANT in this league, and we're rarely ones to chase it early on. Equally, you can look at it glass half-full and say we absolutely can't concede the first - but why not be proactive, rather than reactive. Ultimately, I'm just a casual fan and not a manager - NJ knows infinitely more about his team, players and tactics, but as a layman, it feels we're not making the best of the attacking players we have.

    I do feel that in a parallel universe, another manager would deploy our players in this way. NJ is smart and will continue to grind out results and make it very difficult for teams to play against us. I'd love us to play without the shackles of 3 CBs at times, but there's a bigger picture of not going too cavalier and ending up being on the wrong side of a result more often than not.

    It is just the way our manager wants us to play.
    Spot on, great post. 

    At the very least I hope he tries it against Wednesday if the back 5 isn't producing the attacking threat. Hopefully it will be more like Blackburn. 

    Just don't believe we will ever see the best of our attackers in this current system. They're all crying out for movement or link up play, the long balls must be draining for a player who doesn't really have the physicality/size for it
  • Was there. Disappointed but not too sad at a top 6 side. The problem ,like the start ,of last season is the final finish and chances created. No shots on target is the main stat.
    Top 6 side for now, with all respect to Preston fans, I can't see them finishing anywhere near the top 6 by the end of the season.

    It looks like they will comfortably finish above lower mid-table, which is where most people expected them to be, but I don't see them having enough for that top6. 

    They won't get many more comfortable afternoons at home than that, and their fans will tell you that themselves
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  • CaptainRobbo
    edited 1:43PM
    Croydon said:
    Can we send TC and Leaburn down the gym, they both get brushed off the ball so easily. If they could just hold their ground more they would be a real threat.
    I can't work out if Leaburn is weak as piss or just loves to play act, because for a big lump he is always going down so easily
    Like a sack of potatoes. 

    I want to see King Godden back ASAP. 
    King Godden rather than King Edwards then?
  • I just don’t understand how multiple people thought Kelman had a good game
    I wouldn’t say he had a good game, no one did. But he works hard. I’m not judging him with the scraps he has to feed off and basically playing upfront on his own. 
  • Southbank said:
    Points after 9 games from each of the last seven seasons when we were last at this level:

    25/26: 12
    24/25: 13
    23/24: 11
    22/23: 11
    21/22: 6
    20/21: 19
    19/20: 17
    We were not in the Champ in all these years???
    Lol my phrasing was bad but I thought it was obvious what I meant. 19/20 was our most recent Champ season.
  • I would like to see our forwards attack the ball in the box yesterday Leaburn and Campbell had a couple of chances to but we were not aggressive enough 
  • I don’t profess to be a tactical genius but all the talk about it being either TC or Tanto alongside Kelman would it not be possible to try Apter there ? I would hope he would at least drive forward and put the ball into the box with a decent delivery 
  • All this talk about “our aim is to stay up this season”. Of course that’s true but I’m glad that isn’t Nathan Jones philosophy. He wants us to do better than that and I’m glad about that. 
  • Being the third ‘best’ team to get promoted we have done well to be competitive in every game so far but I do think we have proved we are good enough defensively to be able to play a flat back 4 and have a more attacking minded player in place of Burke for example, do we really need 3 centre backs against Sheff Wed up next? None of our strikers are scoring but nobody’s getting us up the pitch enough to supply them with any chances, TC & Kelman are constantly playing with their backs to goal & chasing shadows, I don’t think they’re exactly the problem & I don’t think it’s as simple as playing Leaburn / Olaofe either
    This is what me and my mate were saying on the way back.

    5 defenders and 2 defensive minded midfielders is excessive and not always necessary.

    I would like to see a 433/4231 against Wednesday. TC/Kelman/Apter up top with Carey behind them. Give Apter and TC more freedom out wide and let them do what they do best. 

    2nd lowest for succesful dribbles when we have two talented wingers just seems a waste.
    Whilst I get why a 4231 would make us better going forward. To me to suddenly tear up the system, formation and style the only thing that has given us any sort of success in the last 6 years whilst we’re also currently exceeding expectations just isn’t worth it. 

    We’ve only got 2 CB’s who would work in a flat 4 being Burke and Jones. In addition, Whether it’s a 352 or 4231 the formation isn’t going to suddenly teach TC how to have end product or teach Leaburn how to outmuscle a cb or Kelman how to have Godden level positioning. The only player who would really benefit from a change is Apter. 

    Something does need to change to make us better going forward but I’d rather experiment with personnel like going Carey/TC Apter just in behind a striker, or Knibbs/Carey in the 8 instead of Docherty when we want to be more attacking, even maybe TC as a LWB and have 2 natural strikers. We have options to try different combos then tearing apart everything that brought us success in the first place 
  • Rob said:
    All this talk about “our aim is to stay up this season”. Of course that’s true but I’m glad that isn’t Nathan Jones philosophy. He wants us to do better than that and I’m glad about that. 
    That’s what he saying and that’s his job to build a positive feeling around the club .. but deep down he would take 4th from bottom now if offered .. 
  • Being the third ‘best’ team to get promoted we have done well to be competitive in every game so far but I do think we have proved we are good enough defensively to be able to play a flat back 4 and have a more attacking minded player in place of Burke for example, do we really need 3 centre backs against Sheff Wed up next? None of our strikers are scoring but nobody’s getting us up the pitch enough to supply them with any chances, TC & Kelman are constantly playing with their backs to goal & chasing shadows, I don’t think they’re exactly the problem & I don’t think it’s as simple as playing Leaburn / Olaofe either
    This is what me and my mate were saying on the way back.

    5 defenders and 2 defensive minded midfielders is excessive and not always necessary.

    I would like to see a 433/4231 against Wednesday. TC/Kelman/Apter up top with Carey behind them. Give Apter and TC more freedom out wide and let them do what they do best. 

    2nd lowest for succesful dribbles when we have two talented wingers just seems a waste.
    Whilst I get why a 4231 would make us better going forward. To me to suddenly tear up the system, formation and style the only thing that has given us any sort of success in the last 6 years whilst we’re also currently exceeding expectations just isn’t worth it. 

    We’ve only got 2 CB’s who would work in a flat 4 being Burke and Jones. In addition, Whether it’s a 352 or 4231 the formation isn’t going to suddenly teach TC how to have end product or teach Leaburn how to outmuscle a cb or Kelman how to have Godden level positioning. The only player who would really benefit from a change is Apter. 

    Something does need to change to make us better going forward but I’d rather experiment with personnel like going Carey/TC Apter just in behind a striker, or Knibbs/Carey in the 8 instead of Docherty when we want to be more attacking, even maybe TC as a LWB and have 2 natural strikers. We have options to try different combos then tearing apart everything that brought us success in the first place 
    Replace Doc who been outstanding this season , him and Coventry are the main reason we are doing so well …Seen it many times you change the style of play to score more goals then you start letting them in at the other end .. and you end up losing more games …… we are doing fine, started well no need to change all I would say is leave Kelman on don’t keep taking him off and replace Campbell cause 90% of fans can see he is the problem at the moment , he not creating , he not offering any support to the striker no matter who it might be