Hull City boss Liam Rosenior has paid tribute to Preston North End boss Ryan Lowe – but his comments about the style of play seem a little back-handed.
We are reaching the business end of the season now and Saturday’s game with Hull felt like a real six-pointer.
North End sat three points behind Hull ahead of kick-off with the Tigers occupying the final play-off place.
A PNE win would have really sparked play-off dreams but it just wasn’t to be as North End v Hull ended in a 0-0 draw for the third time in the last four meetings.
Neither side could find the winner and the race for sixth place remains up for grabs with 11 games to play.
Liam Rosenior on Preston North End
North End gave the game a real go and may feel a little aggrieved after a tug on Will Keane – with the goal at his mercy – went unpunished.
Hull boss Liam Rosenior has now offered his verdict whilst speaking to BBC Radio Humberside and his comments may divide opinion.
Rosenior gave credit to boss Ryan Lowe for making North End a ‘really difficult’ team to play against, especially with high pressing on show at Deepdale.
Much of Rosenior’s comments made PNE sound like a prime Tony Pulis Stoke side, repeatedly talking about the physical and direct nature of North End.
Rosenior talked about long throws, set plays, PNE knocking it long, North End being ‘big, physical, strong and aggressive’, all the words used to describe a team coached by Sam Allardyce.
“Hard-fought, physical, winter battle. Delighted with the players’ attitude,” said Rosenior. “If we’d had a bit more calmness to our play – which is hard when you come away from home against a team that play in a way that is difficult to play against to get rhythm in the game – and taken advantage of the moments we’d had in the opposition half, we could have come away with a win.”
“The players are giving me everything. I keep saying about us improving – that’s a game we possibly could have lost earlier in the season because we didn’t learn on the job – restarts, long throws, dealing with set-plays. The players stood up to it really well. Obviously disappointed not to win the game but pleased with the application of the players.”
“It’s really hard. The gameplan was to try and make the game our game. We knew coming here, we worked on it for the last two days, I played with three midfield players because I think you need an extra midfield player to deal with their direct play and try to win second balls and settle the game.”
“What I’m asking the players to do is a brave thing for them to try and do, it’s to take the ball down, it’s to take the ball down and not kick it back and it becomes a fight, because if we make the game a fight against a big, physical, strong, aggressive team like Preston, that’s not our game, that’s not our strength.”
“Credit to Ryan, man. They’re a really, really difficult team to play against. If you see the results they’ve had here against top teams, they make it difficult. We knew coming here, they would have a really strong gameplan,” he added.
Whether that is a fair assessment is up for debate.
We wouldn’t put PNE In the same category as a late-2000’s Stoke side and recent performances have seen Mads Frøkjær-Jensen – a proper number 10 – take on a key role rather than watching the ball go over his head and then have to fight for a knock-down.
The stats do show that PNE were more direct than Hull though.
North End played 67 long passes compared to Hull’s 49 and 294 short passes compared to Hull’s 443.
The Tigers certainly try to pass, pass and pass some more whereas North End are playing with two centre forwards and want to get the ball into the box.
North End’s current approach has been entertaining in its own way and there are few fans complaining about a long-ball approach, but we are used to seeing North End described as big, physical, aggressive; it’s a tag that hasn’t really gone away in recent years and many fans won’t care as long as points are on the board.