Race for the automatic promotions places set to become more intense

The race to secure the top two places in the Championship looks set to become more and more intense as the second half of the season progresses.

Gaining automatic promotion is currently in the hands of league leaders Coventry City with both Middlesbrough and Ipswich hot on their heels.

The chasing pack of Millwall, Hull and Preston can’t be ruled out of the fight as yet but you would think that gaining a top six spot is their best hope.

Ipswich, sitting third, still have a game in hand over the top two and if they win that one (away at Portsmouth) then they could leapfrog into second spot.

Coventry’s 2-1 win over Leicester and Friday night’s 3-2 victory for the Boro at West Brom meant that the three points from the Blackburn game were crucial.

There’s still a lot of ifs and buts to face up to over the coming months with the Town facing a daunting away run next month … away fixtures at Pompey, Derby, Wrexham and Watford … after their two home fixtures at fortress Portman Road against Bristol City, on Tuesday, and Preston North End at the end of the month plus an away day at Sheffield United.

But they are on a great run at present following yesterday’s comfortable 3-0 win over a  toothless Blackburn however, they need to vasty improve on their threat in front of goal with a host of chances being spurned.

Against better teams they will regret not being able to bury those opportunities.

Two goals in the opening 12 minutes – an own goal from Eiran Cashin on his league debut for Rovers and a strike from Jack Taylor – did the damage before former Blackburn striker Sam Szmodics added the third late on … his first strike in a home game.

Valerien Ismael’s side did not manage a single attempt on target as they drew a blank for a fourth time in their last five league matches whereas Ipswich, unbeaten in five Championship games, power on.

In yesterday’s post match press conference Town manager Kieran McKenna was as usual focusing on the next game and the imminent return of former captain Sam Morsy who now wears the red of Bristol.

But he said of the three points against Rovers: “I think it was a good performance, a good result.

“I thought we executed some stuff well in terms of how we played over the pressure at times and had big chances just from flick-ons and second balls, but also played through the pressure really well.

“Good to get the early goals. I think defensively, our intensity in the first half was really, really good, never really dropped or gave the opposition a moment.

“Another game that we would have liked to have killed off earlier in terms of the third goal and we weren’t as clinical as we should have been, but actually I thought our intent and our ideas were really good.

“We just didn’t manage to get the finish, should have had a penalty, different things like that didn’t go our way, but I thought the ideas of the players and the intent was good.

“One or two moments in the second half that we switched off on that we’ll review and keep pushing ourselves on, but I think another day of decent progress and a good three points.”