Preston North End’s once-promising season is in danger of collapsing nearly two months after manager Ryan Lowe broke his silence on reports suggesting he could have taken over from Mick Beale at Rangers.
It was, Ryan Lowe said, a ‘performance nowhere near good enough’. And you’d struggle to find a single Preston fan who saw things differently.
The Lilywhites were torn to pieces by a ravenous Middlesbrough on Tuesday night. A 4-0 defeat, meanwhile, extended a run of just two wins in their last nine Championship games, a Preston team who were pursuing the play-offs when their highly-rated head coach was linked with Rangers back in October now threatening to fly down the table like an oiled up sea lion slipping down a water slide.
Ryan Lowe was linked with Rangers job
“We represent a fanbase that want more than that,” Lowe sighed, speaking to the Preston website after that Riverside reverse, Boro 3-0 up and cruising after just 37 minutes. “I apologise to the fans because the first-half performance was nowhere near good enough.
“We were nowhere near the levels. And that’s something I’ve got to address and make sure we put right.”
There are no real suggestions that Lowe’s job is under any immediate threat. Preston are, after all, still seventh in England’s second tier. And it’s only a couple of weeks since they were celebrating successive victories over Coventry City and Blackburn Rovers.
Ibrox giants chose Philippe Clement
But as Philippe Clement continues to put Rangers back on the right track – deemed the ’outstanding’ option to take Beale’s place amongst a sea of potential candidates – a Preston team who had lost only once in nine games when Lowe was linked with the Ibrox post have now tasted defeat five times in nine games since.
And, as the PNEPlug X account pointed out at full-time, the numbers do not reflect particularly well on Lowe’s time in the Deepdale dugout either. Since taking over in December 2021, Preston have scored three or more goals in a game on just eight occasions. In comparison, they have conceded three or more goals in a game 17 times in the same period.
