Wasting chances could come back to haunt Ipswich as they bid for quick return to the Premier League
The entrance to the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand at Portman Road. Photo: Russell Cook,
Ipswich Town’s wastefulness in front of goal could come back to haunt them at the end of the season as their dominance, especially in the first half, failed to produce the much needed three points.
Yesterday’s (Saturday, March 21) pulsating draw with Millwall kept them, and their London opponents, within striking distance of a top two place and now both sit just two points behind second placed Middlesbrough who drew at lowly Blackburn Rovers 0-0,
But a Town victory would have put them above the Boro on goal difference … and crucially with a game in hand.
The Tractor Boys were on top before the break and deservedly led late in the first half thanks to the outstanding Jack Clarke’s astute low finish; his 14th goal of the season.
Millwall goalkeeper Anthony Patterson also pulled off a wonder save from an acrobatic Ivan Azon effort in the first period to keep The Lions in the game.
Ipswich had the better chances and could easily have been further ahead as they looked to see out a win, but the Lions, chasing a fifth win in six, were vastly improved on the resumption and drew level within five minutes when Camiel Neghli’s brilliant cross was expertly sidefooted in by Josh Coburn for his eighth goal of the season.
Both sides had chances in the latter stages with Millwall going closest through substitute Miahilo Ivanovic, who crashed a shot against the underside of the bar.
Town manager Kieran McKenna was disappointed that his team failed to nail the three points and said they “should execute better to go and kill the game off”.
He told Town TV: “They score a good goal after not very much; we should defend the moment better … it’s football, especially teams like Millwall.
“You can still lose the game however well you play earlier in the game and the last 20 minutes we could have lost it.
“A tough game, it was always going to be that, the frustration is when we made it not feel like a tough game of how well we played the first half and with the moments we had in the second half we should execute better to go and kill the game off and we know we can do a bit better when they went man to man in the late stages of the game in terms of breaking that pressure and playing forward but they managed to push us back and we had to see off some pressure.
“It doesn’t seem like a great point but we know that it’s the last game of a really busy spell, we’ve got some important players missing and there was some big positives that we can take onto the last eight games.”