Preston North End F.C.

Preston North End
Full name Preston North End Football Club
Nickname(s) The Lilywhites,
Northenders,
PNE.
Founded 1881
Ground Deepdale,
Preston, England
(Capacity: 24,525)
Chairman Flag of England Derek Shaw
Manager Flag of Scotland Alan Irvine
League The Championship
2007–08 The Championship, 15th
Team colours Team colours Team colours
Team colours
Team colours
Home colours
Team colours Team colours Team colours
Team colours
Team colours
Away colours

Preston North End Football Club is an English professional football club located in the Deepdale area of the city of Preston, Lancashire, currently playing in the second tier of English league football, The Championship. They were the main founder member of the English Football League in 1888 and were the first English football champions.

Contents

History

Chart showing the progress of Preston North End through the English football league system from the inaugural season in 1888-891888–89 to 2007–08 when Preston North End came 15th in the League Championship

In the past Preston were famously successful, being the first winners of "The Double" in English football. In 1888-89 Preston became the only team to go throughout an entire season unbeaten in both the league and FA Cup — only Arsenal F.C., in 2003-04, have managed to have an unbeaten season in the top division since. PNE were league champions again the following season, but have not won the title since. Their last major trophy was an FA Cup triumph in 1938.

Preston were relegated to the Second Division (currently the Football League Championship) in 1961 and have not played in the top division since. They did reach the FA Cup final in 1964, but lost to West Ham United.

Bobby Charlton, an England World Cup winner from 1966, was appointed Preston manager in 1973, but was unable to stop them from sliding into the Third Division in his first season and left after two years in charge. A brief respite in 1978 saw them win promotion back to the Second Division, but they went down after three seasons and in 1985 fell into the Fourth Division for the first time in their history.

Preston North End in 1888-89, the first Football League champions, subsequently doing 'The Double'

In 1986, Preston finished second from bottom in the Fourth Division and only avoided dropping into the Gola League because the other Football League members voted in favour of the division's bottom four teams retaining their senior status.

The arrival of new manager John McGrath saw Preston win promotion to the Third Division a year later, and they were still at this level when McGrath left in 1990. Veteran player Les Chapman took over as manager, but left in October 1992 to be replaced by John Beck. The 38-year-old Beck had only recently been sacked by Cambridge United, where he had achieved two successive promotions and come within a whisker of attaining a unique third. Beck was unable to save Preston from relegation from the first season of the new Division Two. He endured a Division Three playoff final failure before quitting in 1994 to be replaced by his assistant Gary Peters

Peters guided Preston to Division Three title glory in his first full season as manager, and quit in February 1998 to be replaced by 34-year-old defender David Moyes. Preston quickly developed into Division Two promotion contenders under Moyes, reaching the 1998-99 playoffs (losing to Gillingham in the semi-finals before finally being promoted as champions a year later. They almost made it two promotions a row in 2001, but lost 3-0 to Bolton in the Division One playoff final.

Moyes left for Everton in March 2002 and was succeeded by former Scottish national coach Craig Brown. Preston were little more than an unfashionable mid-table side during Brown's tenure, though they were never in any real danger of being relegated. He left in August 2004 to be succeeded by his assistant Billy Davies.

Davies guided Preston to the Championship playoff final in his first season as manager, but they lost to West Ham United. They reached the playoffs again the following year, this time losing in the semi-finals. Davies then moved to Derby and was replaced by Carlisle boss Paul Simpson, who took over Davies's team and initially carried on where Davies left off. Preston spent much of the 2006-07 season in the automatic promotion or playoff places, however from March 2007 the club went on an alarming slide down the league. This happened even after holding on to David Nugent in the transfer window and Simpson being allowed to bring in a number of loan signings. The club failed to make the end-of-season play-offs, despite a 1-0 victory over Birmingham City at Deepdale on the final day of the season. They finished the season in seventh place.

On 11 July 2007 David Nugent, the first Preston player to win an England cap for 50 years, left the club to join Portsmouth for a reported transfer fee of £6,000,000. Although the club lost only one key player (David Nugent) and brought in several players including Darren Carter, Kevin Nicholls and Karl Hawley, to reshape the team they did not recover from their poor run of form. In August 2007, Simpson banned the playing of, Elvis Presley's Can't Help Falling in Love, a song which had been a popular part of the pre-match music at Deepdale for over ten years, stating, "I don't know whose idea this song is at the start, because it seems to put everyone in a bit of a depression. We have to make sure we get something which the players respond to and go out and perform and the fans respond to as well. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we are losing games because of that song. But we have to do whatever we can to generate an atmosphere",[1] a move which angered some Preston fans. After a bad start to the 2007-08 season which saw the club pick up just three wins, Paul Simpson was sacked as manager on 13 November.

On 20 November, Everton's assistant manager Alan Irvine was appointed as Preston's new manager on a three-and-a-half year deal, and he achieved his first objective as manager by achieving Preston's survival in 15th place. [1]

Stadium

Deepdale Stadium was built in 1860 and opened in 1878. The stadium currently holds a capacity of 23,408 seats.All the stands are named after famous players Sir Tom Finney, Bill Shankly, Alan Kelly and the new stand is called the 'Invincibles' which is named after the 1888/89 P.N.E team which went a full season unbeaten, all the four stadiums have been rebuilt over the years. The current pitch dimensions are 110x77 yards. The stadiums original plans for Re-development were inspired by the Stadio Luigi Ferraris stadium which is located in Italy.

Managerial history

Listed according to when they became managers for Preston North End:
Manager Nationality Period G W D L Win % Point %
Will Scott Flag of England.svg England 1949-1953 163 78 36 49 47.85 1.65
Scot Symon Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1953-1954 63 30 11 22 47.62 1.60
Frank Hill Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1954-1956 88 31 17 40 35.23 1.25
Cliff Britton Flag of England.svg England 1956-1961 230 102 54 74 44.35 1.56
Jimmy Milne Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1961-1968 350 126 96 128 36.00 1.35
Bobby Seith Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1968-1970 70 15 21 34 21.48 0.94
Alan Ball Flag of England.svg England 1970-1973 118 44 36 38 37.29 1.42
Bobby Charlton Flag of England.svg England 1973-1975 89 29 25 35 32.58 1.26
Harry Catterick Flag of England.svg England 1975-1977 90 38 22 30 42.22 1.51
Nobby Stiles Flag of England.svg England 1977-1981 174 56 67 51 32.18 1.35
Tommy Docherty Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1981 17 3 6 8 17.65 0.88
Alan Kelly Sr. Flag of Ireland.svg Ireland 1981 1 0 0 1 00.00 0.00
Gordon Lee Flag of England.svg England 1981-1983 93 32 25 36 34.41 1.30
Alan Kelly Sr. Flag of Ireland.svg Ireland 1983-1985 70 23 13 34 32.87 1.17
Tommy Booth Flag of England.svg England 1985-1986 42 11 10 21 26.19 1.02
Brian Kidd Flag of England.svg England 1986 4 0 1 3 00.00 0.25
John McGrath Flag of England.svg England 1986-1990 192 74 53 65 38.54 1.43
Les Chapman Flag of England.svg England 1990-1992 91 32 19 40 35.16 1.26
John Beck Flag of England.svg England 1992-1994 99 36 20 43 36.36 1.29
Gary Peters Flag of England.svg England 1994-1998 159 72 41 46 45.28 1.61
David Moyes Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1998-2002 234 113 58 63 48.29 1.70
Kelham O'Hanlon Flag of Ireland.svg Ireland 2002 8 4 1 3 50.00 1.62
Craig Brown Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 1998-2002 106 36 30 40 33.96 1.30
Billy Davies Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 2004-2006 101 45 35 21 45.55 1.68
Paul Simpson Flag of England.svg England 2006-2007 58 25 10 23 43.10 1.46
Alan Irvine Flag of Scotland.svg Scotland 2007-present 41 19 7 15 46.34 1.56

Honours

Players

As of 1 September 2008.[2]

Current squad

No. Position Player
1 Flag of England GK Andrew Lonergan
2 Flag of Scotland DF Michael Hart
3 Flag of Scotland DF Callum Davidson
4 Flag of England MF Richard Chaplow
5 Flag of France DF Youl Mawéné
6 Flag of England MF Jason Jarrett
7 Flag of England MF Chris Sedgwick
8 Flag of England FW Karl Hawley
9 Flag of England FW Chris Brown
10 Flag of Scotland MF Barry Nicholson
11 Flag of England MF Darren Carter
12 Flag of Ireland DF Sean St Ledger
No. Position Player
14 Flag of England DF Liam Chilvers
16 Flag of England MF Paul McKenna (captain)
17 Flag of England FW Brett Ormerod
19 Flag of England DF Billy Jones
21 Flag of England DF Neal Trotman
22 Flag of Ireland GK Wayne Henderson
23 Flag of England MF Lewis Neal
25 Flag of Scotland MF Ross Wallace (on loan from Sunderland)
26 Flag of England FW Jon Parkin
27 Flag of Ireland DF Eddie Nolan (on loan from Blackburn Rovers)
29 Flag of Ireland FW Stephen Elliott
30 Flag of England GK Chris Neal
33 Flag of England FW Neil Mellor

First Year Scholars

No. Position Player
32 Flag of England MF Nathan Fairhurst (on loan to Wrexham)
34 Flag of Canada MF Phil Appiah
35 Flag of England DF Dean Stott
36 Flag of England FW Rob Turner

Out on loan

No. Position Player
15 Flag of England MF Simon Whaley (on loan to Barnsley)
24 Flag of England MF Joe Anyinsah (on loan to Brighton & Hove Albion)
32 Flag of England MF Nathan Fairhurst (on loan to Wrexham)

Technical staff

Manager: Flag of Scotland Alan Irvine
Assistant Manager: Flag of England Rob Kelly
Coach/Reserve Team Manager Flag of England Billy Barr
Goalkeeping Coach Flag of England Andy Rhodes
Head of the Medical Department Flag of England Matt Radcliffe
Director of Youth Flag of England Dean Ramsdale
Youth Team Coach Flag of England Jamie Hoyland
Assistant Director of Youth Flag of England Nick Harrison
Youth Developmant Officer Flag of England Darren Finch
Chief Youth Scout Flag of England Jim McCluskie

Club records

Rivals

Due to the obvious geographical position of Preston in Lancashire, the majority of fans consider Burnley and Blackpool as their biggest rivals.

Women's football

Main article: Preston North End W.F.C.

The affiliated women's football team is called Preston North End W.F.C., which currently plays in the FA Women's Premier League Northern Division.

Notes and references

  1. Ellis, Brian (2007-08-28). "Elvis banned from Deepdale", Lancashire Evening Post. Retrieved on 2008-03-29. 
  2. "Profiles". Preston North End F.C.. Retrieved on 2008-02-01.

External links