Owls winger Ross Wallace has spoken of the busy festive fixture schedule that lies ahead.
While Wallace believes the Christmas period is by no means a defining point in the season, he says the target is to come out of December in a strong position to kick on in the second half of the campaign.
Saturday’s clash with Preston is the first of six in December and the first of three home fixtures from the next four games.
“It’s a massive period, Christmas is always a massive period,” Wallace said. “We want to come out of it in a healthy position to attack the second half of the season.
“That’s the target for us over the next few weeks, it won’t define our season because we’ve got the quality to come back if we didn’t get the points but we want to come out of it in a good position.”
The 31-year-old is more than familiar with this weekend’s opposition having spent two years at Deepdale between 2008-2010.
Since Wallace’s departure from the club, Preston have been relegated to League 1, bounced back via the play-offs in 2014/15 and are now a tough outfit again at Championship level.
Full of praise for his ex-employers, he added: “I think they’ve done absolutely magnificent, the new manager has come in and helped them up the leagues.
“They are very difficult to beat, sometimes they play three at the back, sometimes they go with the four.
“They’ve added bits of quality to an already strong team so it’s going to be a very difficult game.”