I suppose our winning run had to come to an end. It was just a pity that it came to an end the day that Millwall decided there was no number of West Brom players that they could hold on to a lead against (apparently WBA only had 9 by the end and had been losing at half-time). So it looks like the play-offs. Well, a week-end in Cardiff (maybe even a chance to support the monkey hangers on the previous day as a bonus) is fairly appealing. We may even be returning to Portman Road. I have no worries about doing that in footballing terms – I think we are distinctly better than the teams hanging around below us – but Ipswich is not my favourite place to visit. Unlike Norwich (congratulations on them looking certs to go up now) who have really enthusiastic supporters, Ipswich always seems like the sort of place you go if you haven’t got the energy or commitment to get on the train to go to White Hart Lane (if you’ve only ever been to Spurs and not Ipswich you may not have thought such a thing possible). I’m sure (well I think) that there must be some genuine Ipswich supporters but I’ve never met any despite numerous visits there.
Apparently Tommy Smith was poorly so he didn’t even make the bench. This meant that Kyle and Byfield started up front with a midfield of Macateer and Robinson, wingers of Oster and Thornton, full backs of Arca and Dazza, Centre Backs of Babb and Breen with Myrhe continuing for the injured Poom. Fortunately Piper was back on the bench as I think we’ll need him at full match fitness,
The first half we were kicking away from where the away seating is so my judgement of how close some of our chances were may not be 100% accurate. I thought we were clearly the better team in the first half. The game tended to ping between both ends without either Myrhe or their goalie having to work too hard. However, we frequently seemed to have chances that were begging to be put in whereas their best chance was a long range effort that might have dipped into the goal. So we were feeling pretty optimistic about things as half-time approached when suddenly a quick ball was fed through into the right side of our box (directly in front of our seats) and one of their players raced after it – fortunately he was rubbish and the ball was heading for a goal kick. Unbelievably his reflexes off the ball were much quicker and he ran over to Myhre’s hands and, just before the ball went out, he managed to throw himself over them. God only knows what the ref thought he saw, but he decided that this warranted a penalty. Well there you go.
Second half was something of a compliment to us. Ipswich, who are meant to be rivals for a promotion place, played like a minnow facing a big club in the cup. Despite being at home they had no intention of attempting to take control of the game. They sat behind the ball and looked for breaks. We really didn’t have the guile to break down a team doing this and actually had few chances in the second. Breen and Babb were good at holding Ipswich whenever they did try to break but few of the other players showed any imagination. Piper and Stewart came on for the poor Oster and Robinson and we played 4-3-3 but we just looked tired and a little depressed.
So not a great display, although it might all have been different without the penalty. It looks like we will be going to Cardiff after all, all be it not in the way we intended. Having played a lot of the other potential play-off teams, we really should still be back in the Prem next season but we need to keep our heads up – the lads looked pretty down going off. We need to get ourselves up for the West Brom game because the auto spot, while very unlikely, is not impossible, A good stuffing of WBA will reverse the relative goal differences and we’ll be putting those Cardiff reservations on hold again