Town Season Tickets Sales Set To Slump

A combination of unattractive football and a failure to make those play-off spots will inevitably impact on supporters enthusiasm to purchase again any time soon I fear.

The early bird promotion is normally a big incentive to buy but the way Town have been performing – aligned to their lack of goals and the harsh reality that things are looking decidedly bleak, will only foster a belief that it will really be a hard sell.

There is little doubt that Town will be facing a 15th successive season in the championship and maybe, as someone suggested on social media, the sponsors should consider re-naming the competition ‘Ipswich and Friends’!

I wonder if Marcus Evans, with his new-found knowledge of football regrets removing Jim Magilton quite so quick? Certainly in those days the blues were entertaining the fans and we were in a very similar position in the league as we are today.

There also seemed to be more quality in the squad in those days although it was not enough to see up promoted sadly.

The defeat to Brentford on Saturday in front of around 18,000 supporters was the final nail in our play-off coffin. In truth though, even before this encounter, our chances were about as small as Manchester United winning the Premier League.

I still believe that our biggest mistake was not investing in the January transfer window. Manager Mick McCarthy may be too proud to admit it but this was a cardinal error of judgement in my view and we have been suffering the consequences ever since.

I do know some friends who have already renewed for the coming season and in one case for the next three but they appear to be in the minority – although I wholeheartedly admire their loyalty in spite of all that has gone before.

I have pointed out on many occasions, that as a human being I have a lot of time for Mick McCarthy but grinding out results is all he seems to be able to do on the football front these days.

When we looked certain to go down and Mick McCarthy took over, he was without a doubt the right man for the job and we should never forget what a remarkable job he did to keep us in this division.

Unfortunately however, our progression since has not been very uninspiring and although we made the play-off’s last season, few of us thought we would be good enough to get promoted.

I guess that was just as well because if we had have done, the squad would have needed a complete overhaul and much the same is the case today.


Frank Weston – editor of Vital Ipswich