The Gaffer told today's press conference that Denis Odoi was still unavailable (no idea what's wrong with him). Otherwise everyone is fine (no specific reference to Scotty Parker, so possibly/probably he'll be in the squad). McCarthy will have Ipswich playing as dour as the man is himself and in a 3-5-2 formation. They're not without injury problems though, with midfielder Cole Skuse and defender Steven Taylor injured in last week's games while another defender Jonas Knudsen did a shoulder in training. We desparately need an early goal to shake their confidence. For us, a good shake all round could be argued after a run of lack lustre, sloppy and tired looking performances. Won't dwell on Button or even Ream but Johansen has been looking especially jaded of late. However, Jokanovic won't change much and expect him to stick with his favourites - Chris Martin not being one of them. The key will be whether he can get the urgency and working for each other back into the mind set. Maybe he will with this lot: .........................Button.............. ..Fredericks...Kalas...Ream...Sessegnon... .....................McDonald...... .........Cairney.....Johansen....Piazon... ............Aluko...............Ayite.......
The man in charge today is Geoff Eltringham. We've only seen Geoff once before this season, The 1-1 draw at the Cottage against Sheffield Wednesday back in November when he booked 6 players; Johansen and Parker for us. Yellows aren't really his forte though. Only 93 in all of last season's 37 matches he covered and in this year's 35 games a modest 99 so far. It's reds where Geordie Geoff gets a tad more flamboyant - 8 last season and creeping closer with 5 this.
Betts Fredericks kalas madl malone Mcdonald johansen Cairney aluko ayite Martin The two changes I'm happy with and have been wanting for weeks are Bettinelli and Madl returning to the team. Button has looked a bit dodgy recently and ive never really rated Ream that much to be honest. The kalas and madl partnership was working early in the season, glad to see it back.
Grest win today. We are back on track. Shame to concede a goal at the end but we played well and deserved the win. Thought Martin and Aluko wete particularly good today.
Agree COYW. Well, mostly. Comfortable scoreline and we were really good in the first 30 minutes with Martin being pivotal in most of those good things. I do find it frustrating though when we then try to control the game with no movement off the ball. And worse when the opposition change things around, as McCarthy did at half time, that neither the team or the manager seem to react. We won simply because the quality shown by some of ours was better than theirs. Fair play to Jokanovic, although his subs were like for like, they did ensure we stayed relatively solid. And of course for his decision to bring in Bettinelli. Okay their late goal was down to Marcus but other than that (and his odd wobbly kick) he had a solid afternoon. Nonetheless came away fairly happy with the team and definitely very pleased with the 3pts. Dampened a tad by the insipid Geordies!
A good game. Ipswich pressed us high in the first half trying to stop us playing out from the back, but the inclusion of Martin gave us a focal point for Bettinelli's high kicks and Martin did well to occupy their central defenders. Think our wing play was good in the first half, got in behind their defence a few times. Ipswich came out in the 2nd half and started to play a bit more,the turning point in the game for me was the save Bettinelli did just before we went up the pitch for the 3rd goal, if that had gone in we might have panicked. Madl seemed to struggle in this game, not sure he is comfortable playing left side being a right footer, that's probably why Jokanovic prefers Ream in that position. Thought Ipswich kept Cairney quiet for most of the game with their man marking, but Johansen compensated for that the with his industry along side McDonald. Again a bit worrying that McDonald picked up another booking. must be getting close to that 15 booking suspension.
