Well, I guess if you have been supporting the Blues as long as I have you probably are, but is there new light dawning on Ipswich Town football club? I suppose it depends on how you look into the future; either with your pint half full or a pint half empty and to some extent too, whether you are an optimist or a pessimist?
I think I am a lot like most Town supporters in that I am always looking for positives – even when there is very little to find. As I said in my column yesterday, I have been spoilt on the good times but as the years pass by with ever increasing rapidity, those memories quickly become part of a very distant past.
I often wonder whether I will ever be around to see the Blues back in the top flight of English football? I will always cherish what has gone before and be grateful for the experience but as a lifelong Ipswich Town fan, is it greed that makes me want for more?
I can remember a time when ten of Town’s eleven outfield players represented their country and only keeper Paul Cooper failed to get the credit his efforts deserved. We had a lot of good goalkeepers at that time and on account of this, and the fact that he was only 5ft 11 inches, international recognition past him by. He gained a bit of a reputation for saving penalties and in the 1979/80 campaign, saving an astonishing eight of out of ten penalties faced, which I think is still the most ever saved by a goalkeeper in a league season in the top flight of English football.
But the present day is not all gloom and doom. We do have some fantastic players coming through the ranks and surely next term we can expect to see big improvements from Jack Lankester, Flynn Downes, Andre Dozzell, Luke Wolfenden, Ben Morris, Idris El Mizouni and of course, Teddy Bishop!
So there are reasons to be cheerful still and with youth on our side and experienced old heads in the form of Luke Chambers and Cole Skuse, and the purring skills of Alan Judge to look forward to, who really knows what the future holds for Ipswich Town football club?
F.W. – editor of Vital Ipswich
