Cardiff City 0-2 Preston North End: Riis and Whiteman boost visitors' play-off push
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Emil Riis' goal was his first since October 2022 having suffered a serious knee injury
Preston North End maintained their push for a Championship play-off place with a clinical win at Cardiff City.
After a slow start, the visitors scored two goals in the space of 10 first-half minutes through Emil Riis and Ben Whiteman, who finished off an incisive team move.
Cardiff brought on Aaron Ramsey at half-time for his first appearance since injury in September, but the Wales captain's presence alone was not enough to lift the lacklustre Bluebirds.
Preston move up to ninth in the Championship - two points adrift of the top six - after building on last weekend's impressive win over automatic promotion contenders Ipswich Town.
Cardiff, meanwhile, slip to 14th and are now seven points away from the play-off places having failed to win at home for two months.
Their third successive defeat at Cardiff City Stadium was particularly disappointing as Erol Bulut's side appeared to have breathed some life into their faltering play-off ambitions with a 1-0 victory at Watford a week earlier.
Cardiff were the better side in the opening half an hour against Preston, with Kion Etete and Karlan Grant both having efforts saved by Freddie Woodman.
But having failed to manage a single shot - on or off target - until that point, Preston burst into life with two goals in the space of 10 minutes.
Riis got the first by darting infield from the left wing and squeezing a low right-footed shot past the near post.
The visitors added a stylish second as Will Keane released Mads Frokjaer-Jensen, whose cut-back was swept in by Whiteman without breaking stride.
Those goals hit Cardiff like a punch to the solar plexus, and they struggled to lift themselves off the canvas from that point.
Ramsey's half-time introduction got the home fans on their feet, but their team's performance prompted no such excitement.
As for Preston, this was about as comfortable as away wins get in the Championship.
Woodman had a fairly busy start to the game but had little to do in the second half as his team-mates controlled proceedings to extend the visitors' unbeaten run to three games.
Cardiff manager Erol Bulut:
"We started really well in the first 30 minutes, until we conceded from their first shot. Then our confidence went a bit down.
"For their second goal, I thought there was a foul on Kion [Etete]. The referee allowed a lot of fouls. We don't play rugby - we play football.
"There were more faults from us - we can't say this is why we lost the game - but these are key details. Generally, the game was under control but three shots from the opponent, two goals."
Preston manager Ryan Lowe:
"The first 15 minutes we gave the ball away and we have to give Cardiff a bit of credit but, once we got control of the game, we were fantastic.
"Two good goals and we should have had more. I thought the resilience and desire they showed was excellent.
"We're not going to get carried away. The lads have worked hard on a daily basis and they've been a breath of fresh air to work with. We'll never get too high or low."
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