Having given up on Taylor Twellman, North End have turned their attention to Carlisle striker Joe Garner. The former Blackburn youngster has already been subject of a bid from high flying Bristol City but his club rejected the offer.

PNE have since made an offer of £750,000 plus Brett Ormerod and with only 24 hours left of the window it could be touch and go as to whether a deal can be agreed.

North End have made an approach for Dundee United goal keeper Gregorz Szamotulski, if we sign him the first to have his name on the back of their shirt wins a prize!

 He has been capped 13 times for Poland and joined Dundee from Sturm Graz in Austria.

 Rangers are also believed to be interested in securing his services so it is yet to be seen whether the Pole can be tempted south of the border or not, as usual, wages could prove a stumbling point.

Well not Elvis actually, make that Stephen. Stephen Pressley. The verteran centre half from Celtic is believed to be the target centre back Alan Irvine is desperate to land.

 The former Hearts captain would be seen as the ideal experienced head to offer leadership at the back but it is yet to be seen whether Preston can offer the wages required to land him.

We beat Watford, no honestly, we beat them. Even with the two new boys in the starting eleven still nobody gave us a chance. We had a centre back by nature at right back and Callum Davidson playing at left back for the first time in months, but we did it!

I would just like to take a moment at this point to be very smug. Chris Brown was a player that was slagged from the off by most of the PNE faithful but I was extremely pleased when he joined so for him to be given MOM on his debut was excellent for him, and me. Ha!

This week has also seen us tie up the deal for Michael Hart from Aberdeen, although whether he joins up this month or in the summer very much remains to be seen and will probably rely on how quickly Billy Jones can return to fitness.

And so we look ahead to Stoke. I always go to Stoke and we nearly always come away without a win. Sometimes in very frustrating manners. A penalty for Stoke in the 97th minute one year remains long in the memory, not least because of the antics of that uber moron Ade Akinbyi. Also, lest we forget, our time at the Britannia for a last minute penalty came a couple of seasons back to take all 3 points home, but only for Paul Mckenna to kick the ground and see the ball trickle straight to Steve Simonsen.

 Let’s hope we don’t have one of those days saturday. Realisticlly we’ll probably get beat, Stoke are 4th and we are 22nd. This year I would be delighted to be travelling back up the M6 with a point, Forza Preston!! 

Preston’s attack on the transfer market this month is on course to be the biggest in their entire history. On the back of agreeing deals for Chaplow and Brown that could cost the club £1,700,000 - they aren’t finished yet.

A new offer of $1,800,000 has been offered to New England Revolution for their impressive hitman, US international Taylor Twellman as they refuse to give up.

Twellman is believed to extremely keen to sign with North End and neither work permit nor wages should provide a stumbling block.

Earlier in the week I indicated Alan Irvine had requested to the board an approach be made for Aberdeen right back Michael Hart and that has now been done. However Paul Sturrock was keen to bring him further south to Plymouth Argyle.

Hart knocked them back on the basis it was far too great a distance from Scotland and much preferred the move to Preston. The sticking point was that Plymouth had offered £175,000 to our £100,000. Something that Aberdeen were adamant needed resolving.

I am informed this is now the case and Michael Hart should be a Preston North End player in time for the game with Watford this weekend.

The second player set to join a PNE is Chris Brown. Having had his medical yesterday it was expected the announcement of his signing would have happened last night, if not this mornring. But no word was heard.

The deal is not off and I expect it to be completed again like Hart, before the weekend.

Former Burnley midfielder Richard Chaplow is soon to become a Lillywhite. The West Brom youngster has agreed terms after his club accepted a bid in the region of £800,000-£1,000,000.

With Darren Carter and Kevin Nicholls so far flattering to decieve, North End will be hoping Chaplow can slot straight into the side with relative ease if he is to help avoid relegation.

 It is also thought progress has been made in regards to Michael Hart at Aberdeen today.

Alan Irvine made it clear at the AGM in December he wanted cover at centre half and I can now confirm that we have indeed tabled an offer of £200,000 for Nathan Clarke of Huddersfield.

The 24 year old defender is 6ft 2″ and was close to a move to Premiership Wigan Athletic in 2005.  He has been a regular for the Terriers for several seasons and was a product of their academy.

PNE hope to tie the deal up before the game against Watford this saturday although terms have not yet been finalised.

Having lost three strikers in the space of a week, Alan Irvine is keen to add some firepower to his forward line as soon as possible.

The deal for Chris Brown is as good as done. The Norwich striker will be paraded in front of the cameras within the next 24 hours. At 6ft 3″, Brown will certainly add something to our game, hopefully a much more potent threat in the air if we can exploit teams down the wings with Simon Whaley and Lewis Neal providing crosses.

 But it seems as though we are not finished there and are now looking overseas as well. To the U.S. in fact. New England Revolution hitman Taylor Twellman has a phenomenal goal record of 101 in 177 games. Although news seems to be we have had a bid of £800,000 rejected, Irvine is determined to get his man and we will be making a further offer.

Ok, so it isn’t Man United/Liverpool/Arsenal or Chelsea – but we never ever get one of them. We never really seem to get big draws at all, even in the last few years when we’ve made it to the fifth round we’ve played Middlesborough and Man City, both at home. So todays draw is hardly a surprise.

It could be worse. If Derby win at Hillsborough then we’ll be going to Derby to see a crowd of 20,000 plus and probably at only £15 a ticket. A cheap away day and plenty of money for the club, given the way Derby have performed this season, we may even win it!

Finally, we could face upto four old faces if we do indeed visit Pride Park, with Claude Davies, Tyrone Mears, Eddie Lewis and Jon Macken all being with the Rams at the moment.