It hasn’t quite gone as we’d hoped, has it?
Preston moved to re-sign David Nugent last summer, landing him on a free transfer following his release from Derby County.
Whilst we understood that Nugent wasn’t the same player that left Preston back in 2007 – I mean, everyone has aged since then – there still an outpouring of emotion as he made his homecoming to Deepdale.
Nugent was a hero at North End; he played and scored for England whilst featuring for Preston, and who knows when we will see that happen again.
Many had wanted him to ‘come home’, and it happened last summer. When he scored first goal against Fulham in December 2019, it was a ‘where were you when…?’ kind of moment, with Nugent clearly overjoyed.
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Unfortunately, that’s about as good as it got. Nugent failed to score again, and sadly began to look a little out of his depth for Championship football, which was a sad state of affairs for the leading goalscorer in Championship history.
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Nugent is no longer wanted at North End, and he was told he was free to leave over the summer. We understand that Burton Albion and Northampton Town both made offers for Nugent, but he turned the pair down.
As the EFL deadline hits this evening, Nugent remains a Preston player – but conflicting reports are emerging about a possible move away.
The Sun’s Alan Nixon claims that Huddersfield Town have come in with a late move for Nugent, as they look for a new striker having sold Karlan Grant to West Bromwich Albion.
However, local newspaper The Examiner report that Nugent is unlikely to join Huddersfield tonight, which means that a final possible exit route may have just faded away.
Preston could choose to simply pay up Nugent’s contract, as he won’t be getting any playing time this season, but they will have been hoping to avoid that situation by offloading him elsewhere.
Huddersfield may not be that club, and with the deadline officially passed now, it seems that Preston now have a decision to make on their former hero.