Bottom club Preston are our visitors

Preston so low in the table would have been hard to imagine a year ago. They celebrated Christmas in second place in the Championship and were ten points clear of eventual champions RK Sunderland.

Even when they played us last March you wouldn't have believed they would miss out on the play offs, but a second half of the season slump and a disastrous finish that saw them win just twice in eight games left them outside the top six.

It was relegation form and manager Paul Simpson made changes to the squad during the summer to try and get them back into form and challenging once again for promotion. Out went goalkeeper Carlo Nash and striker Michael Ricketts amongst others and they brought in a few million with the sale of David Nugent to Portsmouth.

Nugent's replacement was Karl Hawley, a player who had played for Simpson at Carlisle, whilst he added another three players on permanent deals and a couple of loan signings in August with a third loan signing in early November.

Amidst rumours of unrest, bad apples and goodness knows what they suddenly sold their captain Graham Alexander and he'll be all set to line up against them today for the first time since joining the Clarets. The list of signings are shown below:

Billy Jones from Crewe
Karl Hawley from Carlisle
Kevin Nicholls from Leeds
Darren Carter from West Brom
Andy Carroll from Newcastle (loan)
Paul Gallagher from Blackburn (loan)
John Halls from Reading (loan)
The changes didn't bring about any positive change and with the side struggling the Preston board decided to end Simpson's time there and he left the club just a few days after Burnley parted company with Steve Cotterill.

They targeted Alan Irvine, the Everton coach, almost from day one and he was quickly installed and like Owen Coyle is currently working with the players he inherited with the transfer window closed.

It's not been the easiest start for him and to date he's won just one of his five games in charge, that a 3-0 win over Hull just a week ago.

Click HERE to see Preston's results this season

It really is time for Burnley to start winning at home again. Only West Brom and Norwich have gone away from Turf Moor with nothing this season and it is only some disappointing home results that are keeping us out of the top six.

In front of a bigger crowd against our closest neighbours in this division, it would be a good way for Owen Coyle to get his first home win as Burnley manager.


One to Watch
Preston's defence this afternoon will include Sean Patrick St. Ledger-Hall to give him his full title, one of Paul Simpson's early signings when he joined Preston in July 2006 for a fee of £225,000.

St. Ledger had become known to a lot of English football fans as the sulking defender at Peterborough who refused to play out of position for his side during an injury crisis, the whole thing featured on Sky television in the programme 'Big Ron Manager'.

He went from hero to zero at London Road. He'd started his career with Posh but initially unable to get into the side he was loaned out to Stevenage Borough, but didn't get a game there. However, when he returned he won his place in the side and the 2004/05 season saw him break records for the club.

He became the only player in the club's history to win every single player of the year award on offer, from the players, the fans, local radio and the local newspaper. He even picked up all the young player of the year awards.

Peterborough though were relegated but expected to mount a promotion campaign the following season under Mark Wright. The manager didn't last long, and St. Ledger was involved in the problems that saw him leave, and that led to Steve Bleasdale taking over and that incredible television programme with Ron Atkinson as an advisor and winning the ear of then owner Barry Fry.

St. Ledger's popularity waned with the fans. He received a lot of stick from them and they pointed the finger of blame in his direction for their failure to make the play offs. It was time to move on with Aston Villa or Birmingham considered to be where he was heading but Preston nipped in to sign him as they lost defenders Tyrone Mears and Claude Davis.

He's settled into the side at Preston and has already played in 56 league games for them and has scored one goal, that coming in a 3-2 home defeat against Southend last season. On second thoughts, make that two goals, he netted at Burnley as well in the corresponding fixture last season - our second.


Team News
Alan Irvine will still be without striker Brett Ormerod who has not recovered from a calf injury, and also missing will be Kevin Nicholls who has resumed training following knee and calf injuries but is not ready to return.

Other than that he has a full squad to select from and Billy Jones, signed from Crewe in the summer is expected to return to the starting line up after coming back from injury last week via the bench.

Preston could line up: Andy Lonergan, Billy Jones, Sean St. Ledger, Liam Chilvers, Matt Hill, Simon Whaley, Chris Sedgwick, Callum Davidson, Paul McKenna, Patrick Agyemang, Paul Gallagher. Subs from: Chris Neal, John Halls, Youl Mawene, Lewis Neal, Darren Carter, Neil Mellor, Karl Hawley.

Click HERE to see the full Preston squad
Burnley manager Owen Coyle will have to make his first team change since joining the Clarets last month. It's been six games with the same starting eleven and the same five substitutes but Clarke Carlisle is definitely ruled out whilst Alan Mahon remains a doubt.

There's good news with both Stephen Jordan and John Spicer passed fit whilst captain Steven Caldwell is getting closer and closer to full fitness and could just figure in the squad tomorrow.

If Mahon is passed fit then we can expect the team to be: Gabor Kiraly, Graham Alexander, David Unsworth, Stephen Jordan, Jon Harley, Wade Elliott, Alan Mahon, Chris McCann, Kyle Lafferty, Robbie Blake, Andy Gray. Subs from: Brian Jensen, Steven Caldwell, James O'Connor, John Spicer, Joey Gudjonsson, Steve Jones, Ade Akinbiyi.


Last Time Round
I think it is fair to say that our home game against Preston last season was one of the games of the season, and is probably recalled more than most after we won it at the death with an Andy Gray goal.

Andy Gray - scored the dramatic late winner

It was played in front of the Sky cameras so that guaranteed there would be five goals in the game and that's exactly what we got. We started the better but then Preston came into it, but neither side were able to edge themselves in front.

In the latter stages of the first half we got ourselves back on top and this time we got the all important first goal. Steve Jones beat Graham Alexander to the ball, laid it back for Jon Harley. His cross found Gifton Noel-Williams who played it right into James O'Connor's path and the midfielder made no mistake.

It had been a decent first half, but it got better in the second half and twice we came very close to doubling our lead through Andy Gray. He just couldn't quite get to the ball for the first but was clearly fouled soon afterwards as he went to head home a Wade Elliott cross.

It should have been all over but then disaster struck, Preston didn't just equalise but took the lead. The first from Simon Whaley should have been saved by Brian Jensen's whilst Brett Ormerod benefited from a poor header by Frank Sinclair.

Incredible, the better side and we were now facing a very unjust defeat, but within a minute of going behind we'd drawn level. Man of the match O'Connor won a ball in midfield and fed Sinclair on the right. His cross was met brilliantly by Sean St. Ledger who turned it into his own goal.

It was all Burnley now and in the dying minutes we got the ball out to Steve Jones on the left and he delivered the ball for Gray to head home beyond the reach of Carlo Nash.

There was no way back for Preston and the result was a correct one that saw the Clarets move up to fourth and within a point of North End.

The teams were;

Burnley: Brian Jensen, Frank Sinclair, Michael Duff, Wayne Thomas (Stephen Foster 84), Jon Harley, Wade Elliott (Alan Mahon 90), James O'Connor, Micah Hyde, Steve Jones, Andy Gray, Gifton Noel-Williams (Kyle Lafferty 84). Subs not used: Chris McCann, Garreth O'Connor.

Preston: Carlo Nash, Graham Alexander, Sean St. Ledger, Liam Chilvers, Matt Hill, Simon Whaley, Chris Sedgwick, Paul McKenna, Danny Pugh (Callum Davidson 87), Danny Dichio (Brett Ormerod 70), Patrick Agyemang (Lewis Neal 63). Subs not used: Andy Lonergan, Kelvin Wilson.


Previous results against Preston

Previous 20 Seasons
Season	Div	Ven	Result	Att	Scorers
1987/88	SV	h	0-0	15,680	.
.	.	a	3-1aet	17,592	Oghani Hoskin Comstive
1989/90	LD	a	0-3	5,241	.
1990/91	LD	a	1-6	12,016	Bray
1992/93	2	a	0-2	7,209	.
.	.	h	2-0	12,648	Heath(2)
1993/94	LC	a	2-1	6,283	Davis Eyres
.	.	h	4-1	9,346	Deary Eyres Francis Russell
.	AG	a	1-2	4,485	Eyres
1996/97	2	a	1-1	12,652	Nogan
.	.	h	1-2	16,186	Barnes
1997/98	2	h	1-1	13,809	Cooke
.	.	a	3-2	12,263	Payton Cooke N Moore
.	AW	h	1-0	10,079	Payton
1998/99	2	a	1-4	15,888	Eastwood
.	AW	h	0-1	3,366	.
.	2	h	0-1	11,561	.
1999/2000	2	a	0-0	13,708	.
.	.	h	0-3	22,310	.
2000/01	1	a	1-2	17,355	Moore
.	.	h	3-0	16,591	Moore Ball Little
2001/02	1	a	3-2	20,370	Gnohere(2) Little
.	.	h	2-1	18,388	I Moore Johnson
2002/03	1	a	1-3	16,046	Taylor
.	.	h	2-0	12,245	Blake Papadopoulos
2003/04	1	a	3-5	18,802	I Moore Gnohere Blake(pen)
.	.	h	1-1	15,837	Blake
2004/05	C	h	2-0	15,318	Blake(2)
.	.	a	0-1	18,202	.
2005/06	C	a	0-0	17,139	.
.	.	h	0-2	17,220	.
2006/07	C	h	3-2	14,871	J O'Connor St. Ledger(og) Gray
.	.	a	0-2	17,666	.

Click HERE to see all our results against Preston