That's the weekend done and dusted and all eyes onto Tuesday evening down in Suffolk where The Tigers will find themselves at Portman Road to meet The Tractor Boys. We've been neck and neck with Ipswich the last 6 games (W3 L2 D1) jockeying for position that
sees both sides in 4th and 5th place but only on goal difference as Ipswich are a whopping 17 goals to the good and the joint meanest defence in the top half of the table only matched by second place Boro, conceding just 34 goals where-as City have shipped 48.

Buoyed by a gritty battle at Fratton Park on Saturday which turned out to be a happy hunting ground for Crooks on his first game back since 20th January at Deepdale when City took all 3 points with all three goals without reply from a stunned Preston North End, we managed to get our 5th consecutive away victory, our first since 1966 and we now have our Eye of the Tiger firmly focused on the 6th at Ipswich.

The Blue and Whites also managed a victory on Saturday with a very convincing thumping of Swansea and had the game wrapped up 2-0 by the end of the first half, just to add a 3rd half way through the second half and throttled the swans 3-0 sending a shot across the bows of what the visiting Tigers could expect on Tuesday.

2 former prominent City players never featured in Saturdays game for Ipswich with Greaves an unused sub and just 13 games to his playing roster out of a possible 33 and one wonders if he'll be included in Tuesdays line up to add that "Ex Player" Hex that haunts so many selling clubs? The other player is City's Rabona King, Jaden Philogene, who's current MV is circa £15M has been sidelined since the 17th January which halted his 10 goal run and is, as yet not back training with the team and likely to be sitting out his 8th game with a damaged knee.

Good news for City is that CB Ajayi could be back in contention and may command a space on the bench and Famewo will probably be stepping in for Giles again at LB which may be the case for the rest of the season? All players walked off Fratton Park injury free but Oli McBurnie seemed to have a moment of sickness before the start of the second half which was allegedly because of an intake of too many caffeine gels but soon ran the upset off and was instrumental on 73 minutes forcing a save from Schmid in the Pompy net who could do no more than spill it into the path of a sliding Crooks for his second Goal at Fratton Park in 2 visits. Although victory was assured, Sergej was not happy or content with the way we played but it has to be said, for a team that played below par to the managers standards and still come away with 3 points and a clean sheet on the road sets Tuesday up for a tasty improvement.

The match on Tuesday marks a 3 game run of a very hard hat trick of games in just 8 days with Ipswich in 4th, Millwall in 3rd and Wrexham in 6th as we stand at the beginning of March. Not a time for the feint hearted and a call to arms required for every last breath to be spent while Jakirovic navigates us through the top of the Championship in the way we know he's capable and applauded all the way by a solid and ever present fan base home and away.

My line up would be exactly the same as we put out at Portsmouth (Albeit I would put Joe on the RW and bring Joseph into the middle) while the formation 4-2-3-1 played, is more our comfort zone and having being beaten 2-0 at home by Ipswich back in November we owe the Tractor Boys a flat tyre at least and think we'll nick it 1-0 if we follow suit as we did at Fratton Park but with a little more joined up football.

The last time we beat Ipswich, home or away was 2020 during Covid when Grant McCann Walloped them 3-0 behind closed doors at Portman Road. I'm sure Sergej can match that.

UTT.