[themaclad]

Sheffield United 2 Gibbs-White Berge Preston North End 2 Johnson, Riis

Sheffield United line-up: Olsen, Baldock, Fleck, Sharp ©, Egan, Freeman (Berge, 61), Norwood (Hourihane, 77), Robinson, Gibbs-White, Ndiaye (Brewster, 71), Norrington-Davies. Subs not used: Foderingham, Basham, McBurnie, Bogle.

PNE line-up: Iversen, Storey, Bauer (Murphy, 88), Hughes, van den Berg, Ledson, Whiteman, Earl, Johnson © (McCann, 84), Riis, Maguire (Potts, 70). Subs not used: Rudd, Cunningham, Lindsay, Browne.

Attendance: 25,463 (571 PNE fans)

Referee: Mr G Eltringham



The glum faces of the locals walking outside the ground told the tale, you cannot beat a late goal to take a point to cheese off the opposition support and last night was just one of those occasions.
We deserved it against a side just down from the top division who had 70 million worth of signings sat the bench.
Unchanged again from Saturday against teh Blades who had hit six and we didn't get off to s great start when Bauer poor clearence went nowhere, the ball was lobbed back into the box and Morgan-White who scored for Swansea against us last season repeated the act by seeing his scuffed shot just beat the giant Dane between in the goal.
The reception from the home fans weas loud to say the least, suspect the roof would have gone off the stadium if Sharp had headed home about a minute later.
Having got through the early storm we began to look better, Earl at left wing back looking the player he was a few seasons ago although one slight criticism when in good positions does tend to pass it back.
We were level on 20 minutes Ledson's superb pass to Johnson, DJ's control wonderful, Olsen's goalkeeping slighjtly odd, out of position left DJ with the easy task of slotting the ball into an empty net.
Better side now forcing a series of corners, had to be said United do not look the back but we couldn't get the vital second towards the break United pressed and Freeman shot over from about 10 yards and Norwood was close from distance.
Attack wise we were not as good in the second half, United pressed but didn't create a lot, the first substitution of the game changed the flow more towards our goal United sent on teh giant Berge, he was a handful to say the least and woke the sleeping home support up.
Fleck was denied when through on goal by Iversen at the other end Riis should have done better when also through on goal, his chip shot hitting Olsen and landing just over the bar.
That missed nearly proved to be pivotal as the home side took the lead with 6 minutes to go, ball from the left deflected off Bauer and Berge drove the ball under Iversen
The next couple of minutes United's game management came into play before deep into stoppage time a free kick, Ledson into the boxpoor defensive header great assist by Storey and Riis buries it. Manic scenes in the away end no more than we deserved and a chorus of Riis will tear you apart again was heard echoing outside, the locals were not impressed




Sheffield United manager Slavisa Jokanovic told BBC Radio Sheffield:

"We're definitely really disappointed after everything that happened, especially the last few seconds.

"In the last seconds we weren't strong, focused or concentrated enough - we made some mistakes and paid an expensive price.

"We are conceding a lot of goals, but from another side we're conceding goals without our opposing teams creating a lot of things."

Preston head coach Frankie McAvoy told BBC Radio Lancashire:

"I thought we probably deserved it [a draw] over the piece.

"We felt the best way to try and go and compete against them, and win the game, was to go toe to toe - we did that.

"The one thing I've said is these guys give me everything and you can see that they'll keep going right until the end.

"That for me is magnificent as a coach, you can't ask for any more