He had to be at his best and was only beaten by a stunning 82nd-minute free-kick from Jordan Stewart.Royle indicated he might sign a striker on loan to cover Kuqi and also admitted: “We can play a lot better than that and I am delighted to get through a scrappy game against such a good side.”Ipswich started like a Premiership club in the making with Darren Currie’s volley producing a fine full-length save from Ian Walker after only a minute. Joe Royle will have to steer Ipswich towards a place in next season’s Premiership for the next month without his leading striker. Shefki Kuqi scored his 15th goal of the season before he was carried off on a stretcher just before half-time and will require surgery on a badly gashed thigh. His low, hard drive was well blocked by Simon Royce, who then offered Preston their equaliser. McKenna had a shot knocked down by Royce, and Nugent raced in, beat him to the rebounding ball, and scored against the game’s sense of direction.In the 75th minute, a ball that should have been swept away only got as far as Chris Lucketti, who hammered it through the ranks of the helpless defence.Preston then jeopardised their superiority when Eddie Lewis put in a high tackle on Padula and was sent off, leaving the last 15 minutes with a festering resentment that led to bickering and pushing.

So the happiest man in the world ended the day saying he had experienced “the most upsetting game of my life”.. It came to nothing, but emphasised that Rangers had lost the plot. Their tendency to clear the ball without much forethought also invited trouble, and it came.After 26 minutes, Preston left Furlong space as the ball came across the penalty area from Lee Cook and he headed firmly beyond Andy Lonergan, who had been badly let down, especially by Mawene.Rangers steadily controlled their lead, and Andrew Davies and Gino Padula were particularly dependable and constructive on the left side of defence.After an hour, Preston replaced Dixon Etuhu with Paul McKenna, whose mid-field authority had been badly missed, and Patrick Agyemang with David Nugent, who, within two minutes, provided his team with their first serious threat on the Rangers goal. That situation seemed immediately understandable yesterday when Youl Mawene made a lame attempt to head back to his own goalkeeper, but instead presented the ball to Jamie Cureton, who flicked it up on to the crossbar.That uncertain Preston defence continued to cause them problems, failing to deal with the ball in the swirling breeze and not having an answer at that point to the strength of Paul Furlong, whom they attempted to frustrate by fair means or foul. And sure enough, at Loftus Road yesterday he was outwitted by his Preston counterpart, Billy Davies, who brought on two substitutes – “because we had to make changes after letting ourselves down” – and won the match to put his club well into contention for a play-off place.Preston had been getting fed up with being reminded that it was time to match their impressive home form with better away performances. But anyone going too far over the top is inviting a fall at the next hurdle.

And he has done well enough for Rangers for them to be happy too. I think I have played everywhere but up front,” O’Shea says of his time at United since he arrived as a 17-year-old in the summer of 1998 “The gaffer knows I’ll play wherever he wants me. What we have done this winter is show character, and you need that, and guts above all, against the Aussies. We’ll have to be quite shrewd cookies.” They might have to be much shrewder than cookies, but Vaughan would have it no differently.He’s off now to see his girls at home in Sheffield, to watch Manchester United in the San Siro, for a brief holiday in Barbados, to the Masters in Augusta. But one thing will never be far from his mind, and we know what it is.Michael Vaughan speaks to Stephen Brenkley in ‘The Wisden Cricketer’, on sale from next Friday. England are ending their winter determined to accentuate the positive.

This is a well-worn policy of beaten teams, and Johnny Mercer, the great American songwriter whose lyric propounded the idea 60 years ago, should have insisted on royalties. On the other hand, he could have become a sports psychologist. It is a dead game in a seven-match series played over a fortnight that has begun to stretch into infinity.England won the first, the second was tied, South Africa won the next three and the sixth was abandoned because of rain in Durban on Friday night. International matches do not come much deader but, like the others, it will be played in front of a full house.

If the 50-over format is tired – and when South Africa were scoring 49 successive singles on Friday, it seemed moribund – the public have yet to find out about it. But they will.England’s solitary doubt is Darren Gough, who has a virus and may thus be deprived of his 148th one-day appearance. It is possible that he might have been rested, but since he has been far and away the tourists’ best bowler in this series, that would have been a risky policy.Gough has dragged his international career back from the edge of extinction in the past fortnight. In the West Indies early last year and in the ICC Champions Trophy final later on, he looked spent. But with a combination of guile, cussedness and the eternal virtue of a good line, he has come back.It is not about to get easier for him at 34 and at reduced pace, but he has surprised several people, including some of his colleagues.Gough’s bowling has been the second-biggest positive, the biggest having been Kevin Pietersen’s extravagant batting in the face of open hostility by his erstwhile South African compatriots. Pietersen’s technique and philosophy may be questioned, but his mental robustness is beyond reproach.Accentuating the positive also means eliminating the negative.