Ipswich down Bristol Rovers 3-0 to progress to the fourth round of the FA Cup

The Ipswich Town and Bristol Rovers players line up ahead of the FA Cup 3rd round tie at Portman Road. Photo: Russell Cook.

Premier League Ipswich Town clinched a fourth round spot in the FA Cup against Coventry City next month following a comprehensive 3-0 victory over League One outfit Bristol Rovers at Portman Road today.

The goals came from Kalvin Phillips and Jack Clarke, their first of the season, with Jack Taylor adding the third, in a one-sided first half.

But Town had many chances to further extend their lead including a missed penalty from Ali Al-Hamadi

Rovers sitting in 20th place in League One just above the relegation zone offered little attacking threat to a dominant Ipswich.

Town made 10 changes to the team that played against Fulham last weekend in the 2-2 draw with Luke Woolfenden, the only man to keep his place captaining his boyhood club. Ben Godfrey, signed on loan from Italian Serie A club Atalanta last week, made his debut at right-back.

There were two changes for Bristol Rovers with Romaine Sawyers;, signed from Wimbledon earlier this month, making his debut.

A fine run down the left by Conor Townsend after just two minutes set up Massimo Luongo whose cross into the penalty area was forced clear for a corner.

Town defender Cameron Burgess met the resultant corner at the near post with his head but the ball went over the bar.

There were shouts for a penalty from the Ipswich players 10 minutes later when Jack Clarke appeared to be bundled over in the box by Sawyers but referee Oliver Langford turned down the appeals.

Ipswich were dominating proceedings and it was no surprise when Town took the lead in the 18th minute through Phillips.

Clarke was involved in the goal picking out a cross from Wes Burns. He squared the ball and the former England midfielder drilled a well struck shot past Josh Griffiths and into the left hand corner of the net from just outside the penalty area.

Ipswich went further in front six minutes later through Clarke.

Jack Taylor picked up a loose back pass and slid in Al-Hamadi whose shot deflected off Connor Taylor into the path of Clarke who had the easy chance to put the ball into the back of the net.

Taylor made it 3-0 for the Town in the 37th minute following a lovely move.

Townsend played the ball forward to Al-Hamadi whose dummy allowed the ball to run through to Taylor who appeared to be offside but he made no mistake from just outside the six yard box.

Rovers should have got a goal back with time running out in the first half.

Ipswich goalkeeper Arijanet Muric cleared the ball out following pressure from former Norwich City striker Chris Martin but it fell straight in the path of Ruel Sotiriou but he failed to find the back of the net as Muric’s outstretched leg denied the Rovers striker.

Ben Johnson came on to replace Burns at the start of the second half and Al-Hamadi was close to making it 4-0 to Town when a cross from Townsend just evaded the Iraqi international.

He had a glorious chance to give Town a fourth goal from the penalty spot after former Town player Grant Ward was adjudged to have allowed the ball to strike his arm following a shot from Luongo but his shot went wide of the left hand post.

There were a flurry of substitutions with Bristol bringing on ex Town player Luke Thomas and Gatlin O’Donkor for Martin and Shaq Forde in the 68th minute.

Nathan Broadhead, George Hirst and Harry Clarke, replaced Al-Hamadi, Taylor and Godfrey five minutes later along with Bristol taking off Sotiriou and Sawyers for Isaac Hutchinson and Jamie Lindsay.

And to the delight of the majority in the 27,678 crowd inside the stadium Town’s Scottish goalkeeper Cieran Slicker came on in goal in place of Muric in the 81st minute and Joel Senior replaced Rovers’ defender Taylor five minutes later.

 

 

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