Ipswich Town Women’s boss Joe Sheehan says he and his team are looking forward to putting on a showcase when they host Chatham Town in Saturday’s historic first league game at Portman Road.

The Tractor Girls, who are currently fifth in the FAWNL Southern Premier Division, should be confident of victory with the Kent side second bottom, still without a win in the league this season having taken only six points from their 18 games. Town won the away game 6-1.

However, Sheehan, who celebrated five years in charge last month having been at the club for two years prior to that, says that this week that’s not been the main focus.

“I’ll be honest, I’ve not really thought too much about the result,” he said. “I think the game’s bigger than the result, for me.

“I think, showcasing our level to so many people, being able to be hugely impactful for younger viewers that may not have seen us before but that will know the success of the Lionesses, Arsenal have sold out the Emirates, and I’m sure many children and young girls will have seen that level of interest and support.

“But this is different for us because I think it’s within touching distance for these young girls in our region and I think success for this Saturday will be how many young girls can hopefully go home on Saturday night and look at the sky that night and dream of being another [Town skipper] Maria Boswell, as an example, and playing at this stadium one day.”

A Portman Road match for the women's side has been planned for some while but with the pitch not having been the most robust prior to last summer’s renovation and men’s fixtures coming thick and fast, the opportunity has only arisen now during this international break.

“I think we’ve always been excited to play here but we’ve really valued Felixstowe, that’s been our home ground and they’ve treated us remarkably and we’re comfortable there,” Sheehan said.

“We’ve recognised the hectic schedule that the men have the window of opportunity sometimes isn’t always there, it doesn’t always align.

“But it was something we really determined to do this year as a football club and fortunately we’ve got a day and an opposition and a weekend where it’s aligned and we can finally make our Portman Road league debut.”

Reflecting on his five years as manager, which has seen the Blues progress from the fourth tier into their current division and knock on the door of Barclays Women’s Championship for the two seasons prior to this one, Sheehan reflected: “It’s a been a really exciting journey.

“The growth has been huge. The women’s game in general, globally, has increased massively and certainly in this community, in this town and this region, we’ve also seen significant growth as well, and it’s a really exciting time to be part of this football club.”

While the Tractor Girls have decent crowds for their level at the AGL Arena in Felixstowe for their regular games, averaging above 500 this season, and were watched by a capacity 2,000 in the FA Cup in March 2022, Saturday will see that figure leap significantly with more than 8,500 seats already snapped up.

“We’ve sold out the AGL Arena in Felixstowe for our FA Cup quarter-final [against West Ham] previously and we’ve never really known the appetite for our supporters in Ipswich, so it’s great that numbers have been so good so far and we’re hoping they’ll continue to increase over the next few days.

“We’ve got a very loyal group of supporters that come and follow us home and away, but I think we have an opportunity this Saturday to showcase a level and make an impression on so many people that they can enjoy.

“They can see a real synergy between the men’s first team and the women’s first team, a really consistent method of work and a style that runs really deep throughout the football club. And we’re looking forward to hopefully putting on a really showcase.”

Sheehan, who hails from Dagenham in Essex, says the success of the men’s side over the last couple of seasons has rubbed off on the women’s team.

“I think it’s helped massively,” he said. “The manager [Kieran McKenna] coming in and bringing in a way of working that was new to us, certainly.

“And I think his influence and us being able to connect with him and seeing how he works and translating that over to us has been hugely beneficial to us, our staff and our players

“We’re now starting to see the rewards of what is a really good way of operating and we’re hoping it will be a really solid foundation for long-term success for us.”

The Tractor Girls finished third in the FAWNL Southern Premier Division in 2021/22, then last year missed out on the title and a play-off place on goal difference to Watford.

But this year, when automatic promotion to the Championship for the division’s winners was available for the first time, the Blues have had a campaign of rebuilding with the likes of Anna Grey, Sarah Brasero-Carreira, Sarah Quantrill, Maddie Biggs, Abbie Lafayette and Olivia Smith departing in the summer.

Sheehan, who was the guest on last night’s Life’s a Pitch TV, says it’s been his toughest campaign so far: “I would say so. We had 10 players that moved on that had accumulated 550 games of senior football and we brought in seven players that had hardly played 20.

“That’s a huge experience shift. You’re having to invest and develop a younger group that are coming through again and we must pay praise to our young ones that have come in as well.

“Evie [Williams], who has played next to Bos [Boswell] since Christmas has just turned 17 and has had an outstanding few months of football and she’ll have a really bright future as well.

“We’re not always young through choice. We have tried to recruit more experienced players but there’s a limitation sometimes on what we can recruit based on where we’re at and certainly the level we’re operating at.

“So sometimes we continue to pursue our aims with the group that we have and it’s been difficult.

“But I think we’ll all benefit from the experiences we’ve had because we’ve had seasons previously where we’ve won 10 or 11 games in a row and it’s just been so positive when, actually, football doesn’t go like that and we’ve developed such a strong reputation that maybe a sense of entitlement and expectation comes with that, more so from outside of our bubble.

“So when you do pick up negative results, people are quite shocked when actually we can lose games as well, whereas it’s been quite unusual for us because we’ve been so strong and so consistent over so many years.”

The Championship remains the ambition, however: “We couldn’t have come any closer last year, missing out on goal difference.

“But everybody else is getting better and whilst we are really determined to get to the Championship and become a really stable Championship team, there’s still so much work that we’re trying to do behind the scenes to ensure that if we ever get there, we’re going to be good enough to stay there and compete at the top end of it and not struggle for a year.

“Because, as you’ve seen with our men this year, they’ve made the step into the Championship and are already competing to get out of it again, we want to make sure that we can, hopefully, make that jump into our Championship one day and stay there and compete at the top end of it and not the bottom.

“We’ve got to make sure that everything is in place for us, all the pieces that are part of the puzzle are in place to do that and we’ve still got a few more pieces to get and fit our jigsaw. But we’re enjoying the journey, we’re enjoying the process.

“More importantly we’re enjoying the company that we do it with. [CEO] Mark [Ashton] speaks a lot about having the right people that come into this football club and we’re just the same with players, which makes it a little bit more difficult because the talent pool’s not as big.

“Trying to get players that are a good age, with good experience that can come in and make your team better but are also going to fulfil ambassadorial duties, community jobs that players like Maria do so well, is really important.

“We’re really selective about what sort of players we’re bringing in, which makes it a little bit more difficult at times, but it’s absolutely the right thing to do and no doubt that when we do make that jump into the Championship, we’ll be ready to do it and all the pieces will be in place that we can continue to make progress.”

Sheehan says injuries have also played their part this season: “Every club gets them, we don’t really tend to talk about them too much but we’ve lost [Scotland U19s skipper and central defender] Megan [Wearing] since December, who was our Player of the Year last year.

“Eloise King, who is our homegrown gem, who bleeds blue, we’ve not had her all season and that’s been a huge blow for us because I think the demand that our two central midfield players have had on them week-in, week-out has been really tough and sometimes it’s good to change a pairing a little bit if you need to get a fresher dynamic, and we’ve not been able to do that at all.

“Kyra [Robertson] and Bonnie [Horwood] have been terrific but missing Eloise has been a huge blow to our squad, even her personality and energy around the ground at training, we’ve not been able to have all season. But she’s been with us for the last few weeks, which has been really positive.

“You get injuries throughout the season, every club gets them and some of the ones we’ve had have been damaging to our success at times but it’s all part of it.”

But he says there are no new fitness issues ahead of Saturday’s big game: “As it stands, touch wood, we’re all good. We’ve been pretty good and consistent with our squad of late and Eloise has been back training with us for a while and she’ll be really pushing for this weekend, so we’ll see what happens there.”

Asked whether Saturday will be the first of many women's games at Portman Road, Sheehan added: “I don’t know. We’ve not really looked beyond this weekend, to be honest.

“I think we’re just embracing the opportunity to start here and have our opening game here and, obviously, the remainder of our games will be at Felixstowe.

“We’ve not really looked beyond and this being a regular occurrence. It’s looking forward to Saturday and whatever follows, that will follow at some stage.”

Full ticketing details for Saturday’s game can be found on the club website.

Photo: TWTD

Ipswich Town Polls