Going Going Gone – Who’s Next?

Andre Dozzell has left Ipswich Town. It has not been officially announced yet, but it will be later this afternoon. The seven-figure fee is unlikely to be disclosed, but the truth will out eventually.

The 22-year-old has joined the London club who have already signed three other players so far as they bid to get into the Premier League. Jordy de Wijs, Sam Filed and the returning Charlie Austin had earlier committed their football futures to the club. They finished nine points off the play-off’s in the Championship last term – although they won four out of their last five games.

His father, Andre, who also scored on his debut with Town as a teenager, is said to have reluctantly agreed that it was probably the best career move for his son. He was for a long time loath to see his son depart Suffolk but has reluctantly come to realise that a new broom sweeps clean. Everything has changed at our club from top to bottom, and those persons who were deemed to be responsible for our sad demise have been sent packing. He understands that it is nothing personal. The club has decided to press the restart button after many years of underachievement.

So who is next? Flynn Downes is another product of the youth team who could be on his way shortly too. Dozzell has been at his home town club since he was eight, and Downes signed up at just seven years of age, so could it be argued that complacency has set in? They have only really known one club. It is easy to start to slip into a comfort zone, and could Teddy Bishop also find himself in the same locker room? Time will tell, but it really does look as if nobody’s job is safe anymore.

We have been crying out for a complete rebuild for many years. Former Town boss Paul Lambert said that we are “rotten to the core,” and could be the reason for this complete overhaul. Success won’t come overnight. If you knock down all the building blocks and start from scratch, then you can expect the process to take time. There is no such thing as instant success in football!

With this new project in mind, we hear that West Brom midfielder Rekeem Harper has passed a medical at Ipswich Town, and the 21-year-old is expected to cost half a million smackeroos and with add-ons, it could amount to closer to one million – which is around the same fee we can expect to get for the sale of Dozzell to QPR, and inevitably more will follow.