Preston North End

Also written as Preston.

The club

Preston North End were founded in 1880 and have played at Deepdale in Preston, Lancashire, throughout, a ground now holding 23,404 and one of the oldest continuously used football grounds in the world. They are the Lilywhites, or simply North End, and play in white shirts with blue shorts. The 1888/89 side is known as the Invincibles.

Recent seasons

Preston have been a Championship club without interruption since 2015. They finished 13th in 2020/21 with 61 points, 13th again in 2021/22 with 64, 12th in 2022/23 with 63 and tenth in 2023/24 with 63. In 2024/25 they slipped to 20th with 50 points, ten wins, 20 draws and 16 defeats, the highest draw count in the division. In 2025/26 they recovered to 14th with 60 points from 46 games, 15 wins, 15 draws and 16 defeats, 55 goals scored and 62 conceded. Lewis Dobbin was top scorer with ten league goals and 11 in all competitions. They went out of the EFL Cup in the second round and the FA Cup in the third. That was an eleventh consecutive Championship season, making 2026/27 the twelfth.

Honours and landmarks

Preston were the first champions of the Football League in 1888/89, and they won it without losing a match, taking the FA Cup in the same season without conceding a goal in the competition, the first Double. They retained the league title in 1889/90. They were Second Division champions in 1903/04, 1912/13 and 1950/51, Third Division champions in 1970/71 and 1999/2000, and Fourth Division champions in 1995/96. Their second FA Cup came in 1937/38. Record attendance at Deepdale is 42,684 against Arsenal on 23 April 1938. Tom Finney, who spent his whole career at Deepdale, is the club's leading scorer with 210 goals; Alan Kelly senior holds the appearance record with 511. Record fee received is £10,000,000 for Jordan Hugill to West Ham United in January 2018. Record fee paid is £6,000,000, set this summer for Alfie Devine.

Notable scorelines

Record league win: 10-0 against Stoke on 14 September 1889, in the second season of the Football League. Record defeat: 0-7 against Blackpool on 1 May 1948. Preston's 1888/89 FA Cup campaign, won without conceding, is the landmark result set the writer is most likely to want.

Head-to-head notes

Preston do not publish all-time head-to-head records and none was established for any 2026/27 Championship opponent. The most recent traceable transfer link with a divisional rival is Callum Lang, signed from Portsmouth for £2,500,000 in February 2026; both clubs are in the Championship this season. Preston's first league opponents are Bolton Wanderers, who came up from League One in 2025/26 through the play-offs, beating Stockport County 4-1 in the final after finishing fifth with 75 points; no all-time record between the two was found. Huddersfield Town, Preston's cup opponents, finished ninth in League One in 2025/26 with 67 points, and Preston signed goalkeeper Lee Nicholls from them this summer.

Right now (2026/27)

Preston are in the Championship. Paul Heckingbottom is the manager, appointed in 2024; the exact date of his appointment was not established from the sources read for this file. He has now completed two full seasons in charge, 20th and then 14th.

Three players have come in. Goalkeeper Lee Nicholls signed from Huddersfield Town on 1 July for an undisclosed fee. Attacking midfielder Alfie Devine joined from Tottenham Hotspur on 7 July for £6,000,000, a club record fee paid. Striker Jusef Erabi arrived on loan from Genk on 13 July with an option to buy. Two have left: goalkeeper Jack Walton to Dundee United on a free transfer on 15 June, and striker Michael Smith to Mansfield Town on 13 July.

Pre-season was mixed. Preston beat Bamber Bridge 4-1, then lost 3-2 to Sheffield Wednesday and 1-0 to Cambridge United.

The season starts with a home tie against Huddersfield Town in the Carabao Cup first round on Saturday 8 August 2026. The venue recorded for that tie on Wikipedia's competition page reads Goodison Park, which appears to be an error in the source and should not be relied on. The Championship campaign opens against Bolton Wanderers on Saturday 15 August 2026; the sources read did not state which club is at home.

Sources

Researched and written for not4quarters. Where a fact could not be established from the sources read, this page says so rather than guessing.