Match Day Thread Preston North End v West Bromwich Albion Deepdale 18/10/2021

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MANAGER

VALERIAN ISMAEL

Hannover 96
On 10 October 2009, Ismaël became the assistant general manager of Hannover 96. From 24 June 2010, he was also board member of the club.[16] On 28 November 2011, he took over the job of manager of the second team, Hannover 96 II.[17] In the 2011–12 season, Hannover II finished in sixth place with a record of 14 wins, eight draws, and 12 losses.[18] During the 2012–13 season, Hannover II finished in fourth place with a record of 16 wins, six draws, and eight losses.[19] Ismaël left on 30 June 2013.[17]

VfL Wolfsburg II
Ismaël was manager of VfL Wolfsburg II between 1 July 2013 and 5 June 2014.[20] Wolfsburg II won the Regionalliga Nord in the 2013–14 season[21] and lost to Sonnenhof Großaspach in the promotion play-off.[22]

1. FC Nürnberg

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Ismaël as 1. FC Nürnberg manager in 2014
Ismaël became the new head coach of 1. FC Nürnberg on 5 June 2014[23] and won his first match in charge against Erzgebirge Aue 1–0 on 3 August 2014.[24] He went on to lose eight of his next 13 matches[25] and was sacked on 10 November 2014;[26] three days after a 2–1 loss to SV Sandhausen.[27] He finished with a record of four wins, two draws, and eight losses.[28]

Return to VfL Wolfsburg II
Ismaël returned to VfL Wolfsburg II on 1 June 2015.[29] Repeating the success of his first tenure with the team, Wolfsburg II won the 2015–16 Regionalliga Nord.[30] Once again though, Wolfsburg II lost in the promotion play-off, this time to Jahn Regensburg.[31]

VfL Wolfsburg
First-team head coach Dieter Hecking was sacked on 17 October 2016 and was replaced by Ismaël on an interim basis.[32] In his first four games in charge, Wolfsburg managed to win twice.[33] Ismaël was promoted from interim coach to permanent head coach on 7 November 2016.[34] Ismaël was sacked on 26 February 2017.[35]

Apollon Smyrnis
On 29 May 2018, it was announced that Ismaël had signed a two-year deal with Super League Greece club Apollon Smyrnis.[36] However, after only managing them for one league game against Larissa on 25 August 2018, in which Apollon lost 0–1 at home, he was dismissed from his managerial post six days later due to disagreements with the club's president.[37]

LASK
For the 2019–20 Austrian Football Bundesliga Ismaël was succeeding Oliver Glasner as the new head coach and sporting director of Austrian team LASK.[38] In the first few months of his tenure, he led the team to the best start in the club's history (17 points from 8 games). He also led LASK to a first ever appearance in the UEFA Champions League play-offs. After beating favourites FC Basel the team fell short against Club Brugge. In LASK's first ever appearance in the UEFA Europa League the team won the group with Sporting Lisbon, PSV Eindhoven, and Rosenborg Trondheim. After beating AZ Alkmaar in the round of 32, LASK lost against Manchester United. After the Covid-19 induced pause of football, LASK trained a couple of days too early with full body contact. It was heavily criticised by other clubs, and the media. The team did not play well any more, and 4 points were deducted for breaching the Corona rules, which let them end on fourth position in the league. LASK parted ways with Ismaël on 11 July 2020, as Dominik Thalhammer became available who succeeded him.[39]

Barnsley
When Gerhard Struber decided to join New York Red Bulls in autumn 2020, Barnsley hired Ismaël as his successor. He led them to a play-off position, which was a remarkable achievement, considering that in the previous season Barnsley only narrowly avoided relegation.

West Bromwich Albion
On 24 June 2021, Ismaël joined recently relegated Championship side West Bromwich Albion, signing a four-year contract and becoming the club's first French manager.[40]


LAST TIME OUT

WBA 0 DIREBY 0

LAST TIME AT DEEPDALE

PNE 0 WBA 1 Austin pen

This is the incident which led to the penalty

MYSTIC MACS FORM GUIDE

PNE 10 WBA 15

 

Preston North End take on one of the Championship’s early pace-setters on Saturday when West Bromwich Albion come to Deepdale.

PNE Team News

Frankie McAvoy is in a similar situation to Tuesday night’s fixture against Sheffield United in terms of those he has available to him.

Ched Evans is likely to miss out again, while Tom Barkhuizen and Scott Sinclair are still recovering after illness.

Summer signing Matt Olosunde is back out on the grass, but this game will come too soon for him.

The Opposition

The Baggies have enjoyed a good return to the second tier after last season’s relegation, taking 15 points from their opening seven matches under new boss Valerien Ismael.

He joined the club in the summer from Barnsley, who he had led from relegation troubles to promotion hopefuls, overseeing a Play-Off charge which ended in semi-final defeat.

In coming to Deepdale, West Brom are bringing a number of familiar faces, with five former PNE players making a return: Jordan Hugill, Callum Robinson, Adam Reach, Jayson Molumby and Sam Johnstone.

MACS VIEW
They last played at Deepdale two seasons ago and sneaked a 1-0 win with a last minute penalty after an Albion player fell over on the area, still in the memory banks that one, tomorrow however a slightly different Albion will arrive with their high press high intensive style of play under Ismael, it's not pretty but effective although they have spaffed four points away in the last two matches. They are full of ex North Enders who will probably all get a decent reception from the home faithful, backed by about 4000 away fans should be a cracking atmosphere
After Tuesday's late draw we should be in confident mood looking forward to this one second home match of the season hopefully not the same result as the Hull game


Key Stats

The players listed above featured a combined 355 times for Preston North End, with striker Callum Robinson accumulating the most with 160.

Robbo started the season in fine form, scoring a goal in each of the first three league games, but he was substituted at half-time in West Brom’s last game.

The Baggies have the better of this fixture both historically and recently, winning 49 compared to PNE’s 39 victories, and the last time North End got the better of their opponents was in a 2-1 home victory in January 2008.

Our Last Meeting





The last time these two met, West Brom were sat top of the Championship table and came out 2-0 victors at the Hawthorns.

First half goals from Hal Robson-Kanu and Jake Livermore sent the Baggies on their way, before Darnell Fisher’s red card, which was later rescinded, seemed to kill the game off.

Man In The Middle

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Referee for Saturday’s fixture will be Hampshire-born Andy Davies.

It will be the first time since November 2020 that Davies will take charge of a PNE fixture, with that game ending in defeat for North End away at Rotherham.

The official handed out six red cards in the 20 games he oversaw last season, but this season he is yet to dismiss a player and he’s averaging just over two yellow cards shown per game.

 

Preston North End 1 Whiteman West Bromwich Albion 1 Phillips

PNE line-up: Iversen; Storey, Bauer, Hughes; van den Berg, Whiteman (McCann, 64), Johnson, Ledson, Earl; Maguire (Wickham, 64), Riis (Murphy, 83). Subs not used: Rudd, Cunningham, Lindsay, Potts.

West Brom line-up: Johnstone; Ajayi, Bartley, Townsend; Reach, Mowatt, Livermore, Furlong; Diangana (Grant, 63), Hugill, Phillips (Robinson, 69). Subs not used: Button, Molumby, Kipre, Snodgrass, Taylor.

Attendance: 13,840 (3,219 West Brom fans)

Referee: Mr A Davies

I used to remember playing Albion and thinkng they were a more than decent footballing team, this incarnation are certainly not that, they have some good footballers however you would some of them would have twigged playing to feet might actually win you games at time. Instead they have gone route 1 play for corners and free kicks, fire the ball in under the crossbar from corners and launch missiles with long throws
This was a slog of a game as we had to battle for evry ball usually as it approached the ground from outer space(we did it as well) The flow of the game wasn't helped by Mr Davies who last time he reffed at Deepdale sent off Ben Pearson for having his eyebrow chewed by a Bolton player. The only surprise was he didn't give them a penalty as he possibly should have done for a hand ball in the second half
An early free kick after the impressive Diangana was brought down, Van Den Berg booked for the tackle, however doesn't book Hugill for the elbow in Bauer's face a couple of minutes later which left the German with a suspected broken nose.
Thought we had the better of the early exchange however had to be wary of Albion's lightning breaks, took the lead from one of our many corners in a short period of time Whiteman's shot taking a deflection off Bartley although Johnstone seemed to go down in slow motion.
Albion better after that started to get corners and from two of them we looked to have cleared the ball from the line a couple of times.
Had a chance to double the lead Riis couldn't quite control Ledson's pass close to goal.
They levelled on the stroke of half time Phillips headed in at the back post following a flick on from Furlong's long throw although he seemed to have stolen at least 10 yards from were the ball went out
The second half was dominated by them without really looking like scoring, surprised when they substituted Diangana only one who seemed to have a bit of flair, he nearly caught Iversen out with a cross shot which seemed to be dropping under the bar. Ledson had our only effort on target in teh second period a shot from about 15 yards which Johnstone didn't fully ollect first time. The best chance to win the game for Albion came at the end, Hugill like many a time when he was with us scuffed an effort when he really should have scored, which brought the chant of Hugill from teh home support.
Towle gate raised it's head again as one of theirs seemed to disappear much to the Invincibles Stands amusement
For us Maguire worked his bals off, Storey was excellent and cammeo appearences from McCann and Whickham

 

Preston boss Frankie McAvoy:

"The players have done what I asked them to do and I am pleased with that. The guys have absolutely worked their socks off.

"They gave everything out there today and because of that, thankfully we have kept our unbeaten run going.

"We knew what was coming from West Brom after the break and the team reacted brilliantly. I'm delighted by the way we stood up to the challenge."

West Bromwich Albion boss Val Ismael:

"The problem was the quality of the final pass and the quality of crosses. They were not good enough.

"When you get a chance to score you have to take it. We have to develop that killer instinct in front of goal.

"Our opponents had two shots on target in the whole game and scored a deflected goal against us."

ALBION HAD THREE SHOTS ON TARGET