A Season Of Two Halves

by Philip Ham of Those Were The Days fanzine

(first published in the July 2009 Ipswich Town friendly programme)

It had been a season as dull as many can remember. We’d meandered around the middle of the League all year, sometimes climbing to 7th, then immediately dropping back down to 10th or 11th. Each promising away win was following by a demoralising and dismal defeat at home to Doncaster Rovers or someone similarly dour sounding. Dissent had appeared on the terraces some time around Christmas and despite manager Jim Magilton receiving the backing of owner and now chairman Marcus Evans, calls for a change continued.

The season effectively came to an end in April with two games to go when the play-offs – pretty much the minimum target for the season with £12 million having been spent over the previous 18 months – were mathematically out of reach. We were resigned to another year in the Championship, another season of trips to Barnsley, Blackpool and Preston and not visits to Manchester United, Arsenal and Newcastle. Hmm, scrub that last one. Frankly, it didn’t seem that appetising, having already been here for six seasons. For many a seventh was one too far and vows not to renew season tickets were commonplace.

Then a week followed which may go down as the most significant in the club’s history since Sir Bobby Robson was appointed as manager in 1969. First, on the Monday, former British Olympic Committee chief executive Simon Clegg was named in a similar role at Portman Road, then a day later Jim Magilton was sacked after three seasons in charge.

But it was the events of the following day which brought the club into limelight which had avoided Town for much of the last 25 years. Names of possible successors to Jim Magilton had been bandied about all season: Glenn Hoddle, Alan Pardew, Neil Warnock. Alan Curbishley was even rumoured to have bought a house locally.

Roy Keane’s moniker hadn’t really featured at all, but on the Wednesday it was the former Sunderland boss who walked into an Ipswich Town Media Centre packed to the rafters with the national press from Britain and Ireland. Someone with as big a name as Keane seemed somehow to be a bit too big for us, having languished in the Championship for so long. Keane isn’t so much a famous name as an infamous figure. But there he was, sitting there taking questions with the Suffolk Punch badge on the wall behind him.

The appointments of Keane and Clegg can be seen as club owner Marcus Evans showing his intent. After 16 months of assessing the way the club was being run, Evans was making his move. There may be questions regarding the way Keane left Sunderland, but the way he got them into the Premier League was pretty spectacular, and at the moment, that’s the job in hand.

Keane’s first two games saw wins at Cardiff and at home to Coventry and as the season came to a close suddenly fans were left wanting more and not less Championship football. It had been a season of two halves, one lasting 44 league games, one lasting two.

Much has been made of a ‘Keane Effect’ in the weeks since. Season ticket sales are up and there seems a greater positivity amongst fans and players. Whether that translates into success on the field remains to be seen, but if a positive mood has anything to do with it, then we shouldn’t be too far away come next May.