 Friday, 10th Sep 2010 10:29 Town manager Roy Keane says he’s now a lot more comfortable with his squad than he was a year ago. The Blues boss feels that some of the players who moved on over the summer needed to leave Portman Road. Keane is a lot happier with his squad after the summer’s ins and outs: “We’ve got a half-decent side now. I’m a lot more comfortable with the players, I know what they’re capable of, what they’re not capable of. “One or two players that have gone out the door we still miss, however, the club has made financial decisions which have taken priority, but there were also one or two players who have left who probably had to leave the club. “I’m not knocking them for that, that’s the nature of football sometimes. Players have to move on to reinvent themselves or, like Jon Walters, get a big move to a Premier League team.” The Town manager says his now smaller squad is now much more in line with what he wants: “What we have now is a group of players who I think are 100% focused on doing well for Ipswich, that aren’t sidetracked by anything, not that I see can anyway. “I think there were players here last year who felt they weren’t part of my plans or players who I felt weren’t my cup of tea because of their attitude to training or whatever it might be. “People think I’m a hard taskmaster, but I think I’m very, very straightforward - come in, give 100%, get stuck in, be on time. It sounds very, very straightforward that, but not everyone will plug into it.” Keane is happy with the way things have moved on: ”When I came in last year changes had to be made to the club - the dynamics, the energy, the players, some staff and I’m much more comfortable with where we’re at now. “But that doesn’t guarantee you win football matches, but it gives you a slightly better chance. We’ll travel down to Portsmouth and I’m pretty sure what my team will give me, whereas last year they were a bit hit and miss. “And a lot of that was my fault because I was chopping and changing the team,” Keane admitted, “I was trying to find out about players, I was testing the players in different environments.2 The former Ireland skipper says he has had to be cleverer in the transfer market this season with owner Marcus Evans and chief executive Simon Clegg keen to reduce the wage bill: “I’ve had to adapt as a manager. I think I’ve had to wheel and deal a little bit more. We had to do that a bit last year, but we’ve had to do it more this in terms of the players we’ve been bringing in. “We’ve let a lot of players go out the door, even players whose contracts were up, one or two younger players who were decent players, but we’ve had to tighten up the squad. “Some of the players who mightn’t have been in our plans and mightn’t have been involved, they were on decent money. I can understand that 100% and that was never a problem for me, never. “As a manager you’ve got to deal with different scenarios, last year the frustration. This year there was a different challenge in terms of the players being sold, players we didn’t expect to be sold. “You’re never going to come back and start the season with the same players as the previous year, but there were one or two we thought, ‘we weren’t expecting that’.” Keane says he doesn’t know how much cash he’s spent since joining the Blues but suspects it’s less than people think: “It doesn’t keep me awake at night. People have this idea I’ve spent a small fortune but I don’t think I have. “We’ve done a good job with some of the younger players coming through and I think we’ve used the loan market pretty well. Nineteen-year-old Jack Colback was our player of the year last year, from the supporters and the players.” The Town manager is happy with the new additions he has made to his squad this summer: “I think we’ve invested pretty decently. “You always want to try and buy younger players but we’ve lacked that bit of experience in certain positions. Darren O’Dea has come in and done well and Andros looks a good player.” Keane is hopeful that his side can build on their good start but says staying clear of further injuries will be the key to competing with the other current high flyers: “The other squads, the QPRs and Cardiffs, they’re stronger than us, absolutely. “But if we get a bit of luck and avoid any more injuries then I think we have a chance of a good season, whatever a good season might end up being.”
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