TEPI MOILANEN has lost the race to be PNE's number one after the club's new squad sheet was revealed.

For the first time this year, clubs playing in the Nationwide League will be using squad numbers in the same way Premiership clubs do, instead of the traditional numbers 1-11.

The line-up has been kept top secret for several weeks by PNE boss David Moyes, who was determined to keep them to himself until the start of the season.

But the Citizen has been shown a list of who will play in what shirt during the forthcoming season, and there are some surprises in there as well!

The biggest loser in this new numbers game is Finn keeper Tepi Moilanen, who has lost his treasured number one shirt to David Lucas, who deputised so much during last season. Instead of being number one, Tepi has dropped to number 21, even though the traditional second keeper jersey number is 13 - perhaps that isn't being used because it is unlucky.

Up front, the battle for the striking berths seem to have been won by Kurt Nogan and Steve Basham, who will wear numbers nine and 10 respectively, while Jon Macken will wear the number 17 shirt, which shows quite clearly the new pecking order in attack.

Several players hang on to the shirts they worse last season, such as Graham Alexander (number two), Dominic Ludden (3), Michael Jackson (5), Sean Gregan (6), Lee Cartwright (7), Mark Rankine (8) and David Eyres (11). When Gary Parkinson returns, he will find himself wearing the number 12 shirt, while Colin Murdock is in 14.

New boys Adam Eaton and Farid Diaf wear 22 and 24 each while Julian Darby, in his new role as player-coach will don number 25.

The numbers are expected to be used for the first time against Oldham on August 7 when the new season starts, but PNE have two important pre-season games to go first.

Tonight, Premiership new boys Sunderland are at Deepdale. They are expected to field a relatively strong squad for the game, which will be the first on the new Deepdale pitch.

And on Sunday, PNE travel to Bolton to play in the magnificent Reebok stadium. For Preston it will be novel experience - they are relatively unscathed by injury in contrast to Bolton, who will struggle to have a first team fit for the start of the new season, a problem PNE were more than a little familiar with last season!

The squad in full:

1 Lucas

2 Alexander

3 Ludden

4 Kidd

5 Jackson

6 Gregan

7 Cartwright

8 Rankine

9 Nogan

10 Basham

11 Eyres

12 Parkinson

13 (NOT USED)

14 Murdock

15 (NOT USED)

16 McKenna

17 Macken

18 Appleton

19 (NOT USED)

20 Morgan

21 Moilanen

22 Eaton

23 M Wright

24 Farid Diaf

25 Darby

26 S King

27 Beesley

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.