Preston North End 1-2 Stoke City: Luke McNally scores late winner for relegation-battling Potters

Luke McNally watches his winner bounce past Preston keeper Freddie Woodman

Luke McNally's late fluke goal lifted Stoke out of the Championship relegation zone with a vital victory at Preston.

The on-loan Burnley centre-back knew little about the winner as the ball struck him amid a goalmouth melee and trickled over the line with three minutes left.

The goal earned the improving Potters a second win in a week and brought Preston's seven-match unbeaten run to an end.

After a forgettable first half, Preston's Andrew Hughes put through his own goal to give Steven Schumacher's side the lead but substitute Milutin Osmajic equalised within six minutes before McNally's late winner.

Stoke have been showing signs of revival, running promotion-chasing Leeds close in midweek after victory over Middlesbrough last weekend, but they went to Deepdale on a run of four successive away defeats.

Their new-found solidity was evident in the first half as they held off a Lilywhites side who badly needed three points to stay in touch with the chase for the play-off places.

Preston appealed for a penalty when Emil Riis went down under pressure from Ben Wilmot, but referee Josh Smith thought otherwise, and it was North End goalkeeper Freddie Woodman who made the only save of an uneventful first 45 minutes, from Bae Jun-ho.

Both sides were more enterprising after the break, with Michael Rose heading a great chance over the bar for Stoke before they went ahead.

Lynden Gooch whipped in a cross and, with Josh Laurent lurking, Hughes turned the ball past his own keeper Woodman.

Preston manager Ryan Lowe replaced leading scorer Will Keane with Osmajic to the surprise of many, but the switch paid off as Mads Frokjaer's excellent cross was headed home by the Montenegro forward to level the scores.

The hosts almost took the lead as Frokjaer again provided, this time sending Ben Whiteman through, only for Daniel Iversen to save.

That set up a big finish for Stoke and when Lewis Baker's free-kick found Wilmot, his header reached Hughes, whose weak attempted clearance struck McNally and went in off the post for only his second goal in 29 appearances.

With Huddersfield playing on Sunday and QPR and Birmingham both losing, the win pushes Stoke up to 19th place, three points above the bottom three, while Preston drop five points behind sixth-placed Norwich.

Preston manager Ryan Lowe told BBC Radio Lancashire:

"It was flat. We weren't at the races, nowhere near the levels we've been at. The attitude and commitment were there, we just lacked in certain areas, with the ball and without it we weren't as good as we've been.

"We find a way back in with a great cross from Liam Millar and great header from Milly and you think 'go on then', because we would have had the freshness with them playing Tuesday night, but we got done by a free-kick that wasn't a free-kick.

"I'm not going to mope about that but we have to do better from the cross - we get done at the back stick and Ali (McCann) is in a position to kick it, and kicks it straight at their player and it goes in.

"The two goals were Sunday league but credit to Stoke."

Stoke manager Steven Schumacher told BBC Radio Stoke:

"All wins are satisfying, but those three points in particular because it was the type of game that I'm not used to playing in terms of style.

"I thought it was necessary today to match Preston up because physically they are so strong and the pitch here is really difficult to play football on, so it had to be a battle.

"It wasn't pretty on the eye but it got us three points that we needed. Lynden Gooch defended really well and then in the second half gave us a real creative spark and put a brilliant ball in for the first goal.

"To take six points in a week, when we could maybe have taken seven as well, is a good response."