Manager Alan Irvine leads his team into battle on Boxing Day with the opponents Paul Jewell's Derby County, for the fourth time this calendar year. The North End boss was expecting yet another Rams team, however, after more changes at Pride Park since our clash in the last week in November.

"We will see the fourth different Derby side we will have played this year," admitted the PNE boss. "I don't think our side will have changed as much as theirs will have done over the four games.

"They've have brought in the lads Tomkins from West Ham, as well as Luke Varney and having Giles Barnes back, so it is strange that despite how many times we have played them, we are still having to get clips of players that perhaps our players don't know so well."

The Rams, however, are a side that Irvine is fairly knowledgeable about, not just because of the trio of games already played against them in 2008: "I was in the Everton group who played against Derby prior to coming here as well as facing them three times already this year.

"I have got a good knowledge of Derby and the players that they've got. I also know Paul's style of management and how good a job he did for many years at Wigan. We came up against him a lot and it was always hard playing against Paul's teams.

"They came here and they won in the second round of Carling Cup earlier this season and I think that was harsh on us, because I think we were the better team by quite a long way that night, but they defended well and they got the crucial goal.

"They will be coming knowing that they have a chance of winning at Deepdale and we know that we are going to have to play extremely well in order to beat them."

The official website caught up with the manager prior to training on Christmas Eve and he had just been handed an early present, with news that four of his key players were to be training.

"They are all training today, which is great. Neil Mellor, Stephen Elliott, Billy Jones and Richard Chaplow are all training and we are hoping that they all come through training.

"Ideally we will have the vast majority of our squad available for these two Christmas games and if we do, then it is probably one time during the year when I have to look at perhaps picking two teams in advance. It is difficult to do that, and stick by it, because you don't know what is going to happen in the first game, but it certainly a period where I have to think about the two games as opposed to normally thinking about the game that is coming up and worrying about the next game after that."

In recent weeks the manager has had to keep fending off questions about conceding from set pieces and even the players have got in on the act, with both Callum Davidson and Barry Nicholson this week saying that they needed to sort the problem out, however, the boss is not overly concerned and thinks that the publicity it is getting may help the team rather than hinder them.

"Of course, it is very disappointing to concede goals from set pieces, because we do the work. We look at ways to be better at them, but we are just going through this spell at the moment where they are a big issue.

"We are doing the same kind of work we did successfully last season when we were not conceding from set pieces, it just seems to be something that is happening. It is probably highlighted as well by the fact that we don't lose many goals from open play, so that obviously makes the percentages higher in terms of where you are conceding your goals from. I have to say as well that five of them have been penalties which doesn't help your stats either.

"We are very disappointed when we concede any goals and we think that goals from set pieces are preventable. We work hard in terms of the video work that we do, but we also do the work out on the training ground with a view to making sure that people are in the right positions. Obviously on the day, people make decisions and sometimes those decisions are wrong.

"I don't actually mind if in their minds the players are thinking 'we're vulnerable here', because it should hopefully heighten their attention and concentration levels. If that's the case, then we should become better at it.

"On one or two occasions we have lost them because we haven't responded to something different. We obviously show as much as we can on the training ground before hand and in video sessions, but especially when you are beating teams, they respond in a slightly different way and our players have to be flexible and adaptable."

The fact that this has been in the public spotlight has perhaps detracted from some of the great football the team have played in the past couple of games, but the manager admits that this is just another part of the game he has to deal with.

"That is the nature of the job, unfortunately," he continued. "It is life that it takes a lot less time to say 'well done' than it does to talk about something that didn't go so well. That's something you have to be very conscious of when you're doing the video work, for example, because you can spend a lot more time on the negatives than the positives. When you are trying to correct things on the training pitch you gloss over something that has been done very well and you go into great detail on something that has not been so good.

"It is one of those things that you just have to deal with. I accept, and the players accept, that goals are the key moments in games and people will talk about why a goal was scored."

And with the festivities starting for many families, it was just business as usual at Springfields for Alan and the team: "We will enjoy the times that we have got with our families, but we understand that part of being a footballer is that you work on Christmas Day and you work on Boxing Day. I think everybody has done it now for enough years that you just get on with it now and accept it.

"It is a very important time. Two games in the space of three days. Two huge games for us. If we win the two games we will be in a terrific position, if we lose the two games we will be in a disappointing position, so it a very very important time for us.

"It is important that our professionalism, in terms of our preparation for the games, means that we behave as if it wasn't Christmas."

You can still order tickets online at www.mypne.com right up until midnight on Christmas Day and collect them on the day. The ticket office opens at 10am on Boxing Day, for people to buy in person and over the phones on 0870 442 1966. Fans are advised to get down early to the game with a bumper crowd expected.