PREVIEW: Preston North End vs Sunderland - Can The Black Cats re-extend that five point gap at the top

All you need to know ahead of Sunderland's trip to Deepdale

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Sunderland achieved a well-earned point on the road on Saturday after going down to 10-men against QPR. Jobe Bellingham was show a straight red in the 58th minute for a challenge on Slovenian striker Zan Celar.

Sunderland Team News

Sunderland will be without Jobe Bellingham for the next three matches following his straight red card on Saturday.

Anthony Patterson is still set to be on the side lines, meaning Simon Moore will keep is spot in goal. The 34-year-old has kept two clean sheets in two games so far for Sunderland.

Alese and Ballard are also out of action with ankle injuries and they're joined by Ian Poveda and Salis Abdul Samed, who is still yet to make his Sunderland debut.

The Opposition

Preston have had quite a slow start to the new season. After losing their opening two matches to Sheffield United and Swansea, it looked like they were going to be in for a long season. But, in came Paul Heckingbottom and a positive start under the former Sheffield United head coach saw them only lose two of their following 10 matches.

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Preston lost 3-1 last time out at home to Bristol City. The Robins took the lead through a controversial goal by Ao Hirakawa, former Sunderland man Sam Greenwood equalised early in the second half before Nahki Wells and Max Bird compounded a pretty miserable day for Preston.

The Gaffer

Paul Heckingbottom took charge of Preston on the 20th of August 2024 following the departures of Ryan Lowe and Mike Marsh. Heckingbottom has certainly steadied the ship at Preston with more of a clear style of play, which Preston fans were crying out for, but they can't seem to get achieve any consistency in results.

Heckingbottom funnily enough started his playing career at Sunderland, but never made an appearance for The Black Cats. He started his coaching career at Barnsley, where he was appointed as caretaker manager between the 12th and 25th of February 2015 before getting the role on a permanent basis a year later. He helped Barnsley win the 2015-16 EFL Trophy, as they beat Oxford United 3-2 in the final and in the same season he lead Barnsley to promotion via the League One play-offs.

Heckingbottom joined Leeds United as their new head coach on the 6th of February 2018, exacty two years after he was appointed as Barnsley's head coach. He was then sacked by the club in June of that year.

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He then had a short spell at Scottish Premiership side Hibernian, beofre returning to Yorkshire to Sheffield United, where he initally started as the reserve team coach. Following the sacking of Chris Wilder in March 2021, he took charge of the Blades remaining 11 Premier League game before returning to his role as the U23s coach following the appointment of Slavisa Jokanovic.

After a poor start under Jokanovic, the Serbian was sacked and Heckingbottom took charge once again. He helped the blades to a Championship play-off spot where they were knocked out in the semi-finals by Nottingham Forest. The following season, he lead them to promotion finishing second to Burnley.

Opposition Team News

Milutin Osmajic is still serving his eight match ban for biting Blakcburn's Owen Beck.

Fellow strikers Ched Evans and Will Keane are also out injured.

Robbie Brady is still out on the side lines after picking up an ankle injury in Preston's 3-3 draw with Plymouth Argyle.

The Referee

Tonight's referee is Lewis Smith.

This will be the first time that Smith has refereed a Sunderland game at senior level.

He has previously refereed the U21s on two occasions with them winning one and losing one.

EFL Stat Pack

As per the EFL website:

Preston North End have lost two of their last three league games against Sunderland (W1), as many as in their previous 14 meetings (W6 D6 L2).

Sunderland have lost three of their last five league visits to Deepdale (W1 D1), losing 2-1 in August 2023.

At Deepdale, Preston are unbeaten in their last 21 league games in midweek (W10 D11), only Manchester City are enjoying a longer ongoing such run in the top four tiers of English football (49 games unbeaten).

Sunderland have won both their midweek league games so far this season and could win three in a row for the first time since February 2023.

Preston manager Paul Heckingbottom is unbeaten in five previous encounters with Sunderland in the Football League (W4 D1), only against Birmingham (P6 W4 D2) has he faced a side more often in the Football League without losing.

Predicted Line up: Moore, Hume, Mepham, O'Nien, Cirkin, Rigg, Neil, Browne, Mundle, Isidor, Roberts