The last few seasons at Town and the contrast with the short term win at any cost mentality of managers like Mick McCarthy that saw us drop to League One prove otherwise.
I feel it’s a bit of that and just the massive step up in quality we’re playing week in, week out. League One and the Championship are much more forgiving leagues than the Premier League, as we’re finding out. The signs of positivity is that we’ve played three teams in last season’s top four and only three home games so far this season. I think it’s our home form that will decide if we go down or stay up. If we do manage to stay up, the hope is we don’t then need another massive recruitment drive to upgrade players we’ve brought in who have struggled. Players like Johnson, Szmodics, and Ogbene look like they’re struggling and unable to put down serious claims for starting games.
The other problem is game time for our newbies. Poor Szmodics, who started well early season, and proved a handful, has only come on when the game is almost lost, and is expected to turn things around.
Yeah, get the impression McKenna doesn’t yet know what attacking line up to trust other than Delap up top. I think Spanish and a couple of others want to see an attacking midfield trio of Clarke on the left, Hutchinson down the right, and Szmodics through the middle. I’d like to see that over the next few matches.
Anyone else think McKenna should change the system and formation for away games - or is that likely to further disrupt new players settling in and change a previously successful style? I do feel we need to be more defensively solid. A back three of Greaves, O’Shea and Woolfenden behind Davis at left wing back and maybe Burns at right wing back should be more solid. It’ll also allow Davis to focus more on attacking - which is his strength - rather than defending. A midfield duo of Morsy and Phillips behind an attacking trio of Hutchinson, Szmodics, and Delap (pace on the break) could work. If we’re chasing games and opt to go long, could always switch to a - can’t believe I’m saying it - two up top with Hirst and Delap, with one central attacking midfielder behind. Fortunately still early days, but we’ve only managed two points out of a possible 12 away from home, including trips to Southampton and West Ham. We played three at the back throughout most of pre-season and although they were friendlies, kept consecutive clean sheets against strong opposition.
Lots of sensible ideas there Nuggets. Or he could go with the regular Championship team, those who are left!
Tuanzebe and Morsy have certainly made the step up. Could be an argument to give Woolfenden, Burgess, Luongo, Chaplin, Burns, and Hirst some more opportunities. From what I’ve seen from them so far this season - which in some cases is relatively little game time - I’m not sure any of them are making overly strong cases. McKenna spent several years managing the Manchester United first team in the Premier League, so he knows the standard. Maybe he’s expecting too much from last year’s group of players? He has trained most of those aforementioned Ipswich players for almost three years now. I do think it’s a case that he knows or strongly suspects those players aren’t ready/quite cut out for regular first time Premier League football.
It wasn't an instant fix when KMc first came in and I remember a few questioned whether he was up to the task of building a winning side from a mostly new squad.We're almost back to that stage again with well over half the side for most games this Season having joined in the Summer. We just need patience and remember the good performances have shown enough to give us hope of surviving this Season and then pushing on.
Think wolfenden can consider himself unlucky not to be playing. For me, he was MOM against Fulham but then has been dropped. Still early days with the team needing to gel but for me, the balance is not right yet. Neither Ogbene or Burns have been impressive down the right and Hutchinson hasn’t looked great in the 10. Think szmodics definitely deserves a game there. Other main concern in the keeper - not sure what to make of him which is a problem as that is 1 area where consistency is very important
