Ryan Lowe explains young Preston North End reserve side against Wrexham

Preston North End’s young reserve team on Tuesday was due to the senior squad playing an in-house 11 aside match.

The Lilywhites fell to a 1-2 defeat in the Central League cup tie against Wrexham, held at Springfields - Preston’s former training ground and present home of the academy. Callum Havard’s penalty sent Preston in ahead at the break, but the visitors turned the game on its head in the second half - thanks to goals from Rio Owen and Callum Edwards.

North End’s team was made up of first and second year scholars, with Nick Harrison overseeing the game alongside coaches and former Preston men Andy Fensome and John Welsh. It was PNE’s first match in the cup, after victory over Bolton Wanderers and defeat to Blackpool in the league. Lowe is open to giving first team players minutes in the competition, but only if deemed appropriate.

When asked if Preston had agreed to play a young side with Wrexham, Lowe joked: “I won’t be doing any more agreements! No, I left that down to Nick and the lads at Springfields. We had an 11v11 on Tuesday, in house, with our lads. So, we needed all the bodies. Some of the youngsters didn’t play down there; we had the lads who we needed, to go through our preparations for the weekend.

“That was more important than some of them going down to play a game against Wrexham, which is what it is. We’ve got some good youngsters up here and one or two of them might be disappointed at not getting game time, but it’s important they are doing what we need them to do - because they are part of the first team. So yeah. We will do that at home (play senior lads in the Central League) and make sure that it’s here. We could’ve played one or two. If it was next week, we could’ve played Ched (Evans), Calvin (Ramsay) or some of the other lads.

“It wasn’t to be; the timing wasn’t right. But, the Central League will be played here (at Euxton) most times, when we’ll play some of the seniors. We won’t send them down to Springies or away somewhere, we’ll try to get the games here and it still will be used. Tuesday, it was more important for us to go through our preparation for Millwall than the game against Wrexham was.”