Preston North End should capitalise on Middlesbrough player situation and bag free transfer | OneFootball

Preston North End have already begun making movements for good quality Championship players, and this Middlesbrough man could be next

The transfer window is getting closer to its official start date, and Preston North End have already begun making movements for good-quality Championship players.

Preston announced their first signing of the upcoming summer transfer window just over a week ago when they moved quickly to secure the services of Stoke City midfielder Jordan Thompson upon the expiry of his contract with the Potters.

In an FLW exclusive weeks ago, it was reported that Leicester City goalkeeper Daniel Iversen would also shortly be coming to Deepdale, having previously spent a year and a half on loan at Preston. As of this week, that has been confirmed by PNE.

Following that trend, another player who will be available this summer who Paul Heckingbottom and the Preston board should be considering is soon-to-be departed Middlesbrough man, Anfernee Dijksteel.

It was announced that the 28-year-old was to be the only confirmed departure from the first team when Boro released their retained list for 2025.

The Suriname international is already the subject of interest for some of Preston’s rivals in the Championship. It was reported by journalist Darren Witcoop that both QPR and Millwall are set to try and land Dijksteel’s signature this summer, but North End would be foolish not to pay any attention of their own.

Preston now have a lack of depth at full-back – there is a need for transfers

Preston have been playing pretty consistently with a back five in the Championship since 2019. They began to do so under Alex Neil, and have kept using this tactic under all of Frankie McAvoy, Ryan Lowe and now Heckingbottom.

During 2024/25, they had enough squad depth to manage the repeated use of this formation. Aston Villa loanee Kaine Kesler-Hayden, veteran Robbie Brady and the dynamic Brad Potts all featured throughout the season.

There were also occasional cameos by Josh Bowler (until his loan deal from Nottingham Forest was cut short), Jeppe Okkels (until HIS loan departure to Aberdeen), youngster Kian Best, and even squad regular Andrew Hughes moonlighting as a wing-back despite his usual position at centre-back.

With that campaign now over and the squad ahead of next season confirmed, PNE have some shopping to do. Both Kesler-Hayden and Best are gone, Brady is getting older, and Potts spent the majority of the second half of last season injured. Dijksteel could be the perfect solution to this problem.

Like Hughes, the former Charlton man can operate as both a centre-back and a full-back, and has repeatedly shown his ability at Championship level for Middlesbrough.

The 2024/25 season was Dijksteel’s sixth on Teesside, and was speculated part-way through by TeessideLive to be his most successful.

After he scored during a 1-1 draw for Boro against Burnley in December, manager Michael Carrick said: “I think he’s certainly playing the best football I’ve seen him play since I’ve been here. The games he’s played have been really good. He’s playing in a winning team in a variety of games this season. He’s just in a good place.”

He was also a key man for Boro during the 2021/22 campaign, where he made 34 Championship appearances as they just missed out on the play-offs. He was central to 11 clean sheets and notched four assists along the way.

Dijksteel could be another shrewd addition to PNE’s list of free arrivals this summer

Kesler-Hayden is the big loss for Preston ahead of next season. The Villa man won the club’s Player of the Season award, and his tirelessness up and down the right flank will be missed at Deepdale.

Dijksteel could well be the ideal man to take Kesler-Hayden’s place, and he’d be doing so on a permanent contract. At a shade over six foot, he has the presence and record of a well-rounded defender, competitive with the numbers achieved by PNE's departing loanee.

During his highly successful 2021/22 campaign, Boro Breakdown podcast co-host Dana Malt was quoted by Breaking The Lines as saying that Dijksteel is "a man who relishes a physical encounter as much as he does a foot race, a deadly combination for a defender, particularly when he finds added confidence to play with aggression".

She continued: "He very rarely gets caught out defensively and on the rare occasions he does, he has the pace and composure to recover. His reading of certain situations, especially when tasked with a tricky winger or powerful forward, is very good."

Also in that season, Dijksteel featured several times as an out-and-out right midfielder, notably against Coventry City and Preston's local rivals Blackburn Rovers.

The ability to play up and down the right side of the field is something that Preston were reliant on from their latest loan sensation throughout last season, and it’s something that they should prioritise in a replacement.

Dijksteel would be a great fit for the way Preston North End want to play under Heckingbottom.

The club have released a handful of key players for free going into this summer, and they appear to want to bring in their replacements in the same fashion, as they have with both Thompson and Iversen. To pull this off with Dijksteel would be a very smart move.