Sam Greenwood is now working under a former Leeds United manager in Paul Heckingbottom while on loan at Preston North End.
Greenwood made the season-long-loan switch to Deepdale in the summer under a different boss in Ryan Lowe, who was sacked just one match into the season.
Thankfully the change in the dugout has not had any impact on Greenwood‘s game time, with this almost certainly his last chance to show he has what it takes to make it at Elland Road.
It has been an up and down start to life for Greenwood at North End, though the Carabao Cup has proved to be a fruitful competition, netting twice in a 5-0 win at Harrogate Town.
Greenwood then came off the bench on Tuesday night to score two spot-kicks in an incredible 16-15 penalty shootout victory over Premier League side Fulham.
Heckingbottom tells Leeds loanee Greenwood where to improve
Coming through the ranks at both Arsenal and Leeds, Greenwood was always heralded as one of the most talented young players around.
Greenwood would find himself on the scoresheet most weeks playing as a striker for the U21s, but his progression into first team football saw him drop into a deeper midfield role under Jesse Marsch.
Thanks to his set-pieces and ball striking ability, it is clear the sort of quality Greenwood possesses but failure to nail down a best position is what has let him down at Leeds and on loan at Middlesbrough.
Speaking to the Lancashire Evening Post about what life has been like working with Greenwood, Heckingbottom says he is always one of the best players in training but just needs to find more ‘consistency’ and ‘end product’.
He said: “Yeah, we’ve been really pleased with Sam, in terms of how he’s responded to us coming through the door. Usually, when you watch training and games back, he is involved in a lot of good things for us – whether it’s a chance, effort on goal, energy to win the ball back.
“Probably, if you totted them all up, Sam would be somewhere in the top three for each of those. He is that type of player, so we want to get more out of him. We want him to understand that’s what he brings.
“And, as he is, he loves working on every part of his game at the training ground. It’s just then working on the end product, the consistency and being even better when does have the ball.”
What PNE’s media said about Greenwood vs Fulham
As mentioned, Greenwood played a pretty important role in PNE’s cup win over Fulham on Tuesday night.
It is no surprise to hear he had the quality to dispatch two penalties with ease, but the more encouraging part of his media rating from the Lancashire Evening Post is how he did during normal time.
They wrote: “Sam Greenwood – 7. Did both sides of the game well after being brought on. His spot kicks were top quality. Added a bit of nous in the closing stages of normal time and made no mistake in the shootout. A couple of very confident penalties stuck away.”
Leave a Reply