Moyes plans to put aside friendships for Preston's arrival

David Moyes and the Preston manager, Billy Davies, go back a long way but old friendships will be put aside when the Scotsmen meet in the Carling Cup at Goodison Park tonight.

David Moyes and the Preston manager, Billy Davies, go back a long way but old friendships will be put aside when the Scotsmen meet in the Carling Cup at Goodison Park tonight.

The Everton manager Moyes and Davies were friends and rivals in their schoolboy days in Glasgow football and later in their careers, and even ended up regularly sharing a car to training when they both played for Dunfermline 14 years ago.

But they will be in opposite dug-outs for the third-round tie which sees Davies bringing his Championship promotion hopefuls to face Moyes's third-placed Premier League team.

Moyes said: "We will have a glass of wine together afterwards but for the match he will be wanting to pull off a shock result and I will want to make sure Everton get into the next round."

The added incentive for Moyes is he also used to manage Preston before moving to Everton in March 2002.

Now Davies, No 2 until Craig Brown left earlier in the season, has taken over the Deepdale reins for his first big job in English football, after a spell as manager of Motherwell.

"I've known Billy for a long time, since we were both young boys, he went to sign for Rangers and I joined Celtic and we competed against each other for a few years and played together in different Scottish teams," Moyes said. "As we got older we went our different ways but got back together again later in our careers when we were both playing for Dunfermline. We used to share a car to get to training and spent a lot of time talking tactics."

Moyes still recalls his time as an up-and-coming manager at Preston with great affection and even recalls bringing North End to Goodison two years ago for an FA Cup tie which the Merseysiders struggled to win 2-0.

"It's not my side now though, it's Billy's. But I do look back on my time at Preston with great affection," he said. "They gave me a great start to my management career and I will always be grateful for that.

"They have good players, they have added a few more since I was there and all round they are a decent team.

"I still look for their results and I hope they do well and the players they have there do well, but I am focused now on making sure Everton win this one.

"Billy has had a good start and he will be enjoying it. It is a great club to have a start in, they have good facilities and good people around the club.

"This is his first big job in England, he had previously been manager of Motherwell so this will be a big chance for him and I hope he does well."

Alan Stubbs is Everton's only doubt. The 33-year-old defender has picked up a calf injury and if he fails to recover in time then Joseph Yobo should step into the side.

The Scottish full-back Gary Naysmith will miss his third successive match with the ankle injury he picked up playing for Scotland in Moldova earlier this month.

However, the Chinese midfielder Li Tie is close to a return after his broken leg, and could play in the reserves against Wolves in a fortnight.

Everton do not have a big enough squad to make wholesale changes for the cup tie but James McFadden, Nick Chadwick and Richard Wright should all be involved.