In-form Preston North End continued their ascent up the Championship league table with a convincing 3-1 home win over automatic promotion candidates Norwich City during the week with Preston manager, Alex Neil, scoring one against his former club.
That victory over Norwich extended Preston’s unbeaten run to six matches which has seen them climb away from the lower reaches of the Championship and up into the relative safety of 13th place.
Preston NE have a great opportunity to grab another three points at Deepdale again on Saturday afternoon when they entertain an inconsistent Nottingham Forest outfit, and having won four of their last five in the second tier with wins against QPR, Stoke City, Bolton Wanderers and most impressive of all, Norwich City, Alex Neil’s side won’t fear anyone on home turf at the moment.
The hosts have lost on just three occasions so far this season and they’re unbeaten in their last four matches at Deepdale with the win over Norwich following three draws on the trot with Aston Villa, Swansea City and Derby County, 1-1, 1-1 and 0-0 respectively.
The draw has featured prominently in Preston’s home matches to date as 7 of their 16 matches played have resulted in stalemate.
Nottingham Forest followed up their 2-1 home win over Brentford on the weekend with a point away at West Brom in a 2-2 draw which incidentally became Nottingham Forest’s ninth draw away from home this season, which is tied with Stoke City for the highest number of away draws in the Championship to date.
Forest manager, Martin O’Neill is still looking for greater consistency from his squad after he replaced former boss Aitor Karanka, with his side producing mixed returns so far; wins over Wigan Athletic and Brentford have been offset by defeats to Bristol City and Birmingham City.
The visitors also make their way up to Preston without an away win since the end of November when they scored a 2-0 win at Hull City, but since then, the Tricky Trees have been anything but as they’ve lost at Millwall, Reading and Birmingham City and have drawn the other four matches.
The statistics suggest that these two teams could be headed for a share of the spoils on Saturday afternoon as between them, they’ve been involved in 16 draws out of a total of 32 matches (16 home matches, 16 away matches), as well as 3 of the last 7 meetings between these two sides ending in stalemate.