Ryan Lowe on how Preston North End become a play-off side despite 'impossible' test

Preston North End manager Ryan Lowe has reiterated the need for the Lilywhites to work ‘smarter’ if they are to break into the play-offs.

The Lilywhites have one more game to contest this season - away to West Brom. North End could finish anywhere from ninth to 12th on the final day, having seen play-off hopes fade away with five matches left to play. Preston have lost their last four games, against Leicester City, QPR, Southampton and Norwich City.

Lowe guided PNE to 13th in 2021/22 - having joined in early December - and 12th last season. Since returning to the Championship, in 2015, North End’s highest finish has been 7th (2017/18), with the lowest 14th (2018/19). Lowe isn’t the first manager at Deepdale tasked with bridging the gap to the top six. But, how does he take them there?

“How does it make it?” said Lowe, when asked how PNE go to that next level. “We’ve got good finances and the remit is to stay within those finances. Cup games obviously help, if you get big hitters. And generating money through player sales, or whatever it may be that can help. But ultimately, we’ve got to be a bit smarter as well.

“I think we’ve had good recruitment spells. It’s probably been the best recruitment, I think anyway, and probably the most balanced squad we’ve had for a while. The depth of it has been hit a bit, as you can see - though some of the youngsters have been excellent. We’ve got to be a bit smarter and cleverer in everything we do, so if that’s 5 per cent or 2 per cent from each player and each member of staff... we can do that and you can achieve it.

“But, we can’t compete with teams that spend £40/50/60/70/80million pounds. It is just impossible, but we don’t complain about it - we just get on with it. We’ve got to try and overachieve what we do and I think we have done. So, if you’re looking at budgets and whatever else and where we should probably sit, we’ve well overachieved with where we are now. But, we cannot grumble, because we are all well paid, everyone gets looked after at the football club and the family puts its money into the football club - when they don’t necessarily need to.

“And we are grateful for that, so we just need to keep overachieving - and the progression is there, as you see. From the academy, right the way through and youngsters making their debuts - Theo Mawene the latest, at 16-years-of-age. We’ve had a couple of international call-ups, so we are going in the right direction. But, it is hard, as everyone knows.

“Some people will look at it a bit differently and say: ‘No, we should be there’. But, you only have to look at some of the teams in and around it - I won’t mention any names but I think we’re on par with one team who spent £37m. So, we are not doing badly, considering we don’t spend anywhere near that on players.”