Town boss Mick McCarthy will have money available to strengthen his squad in January if he needs it, according to joint-MD Jonathan Symonds.

“Absolutely,” he told TWTD when asked if funds would be available during the next transfer window. “There’ll be money to spend, if necessary.”

McCarthy added significantly to his squad over the summer but the £20,000 paid to Waterford United for youngster Jack Doherty was the only fee paid.

Symonds’s fellow MD Ian Milne says that this was partly down to so many Championship players being available on Bosman free transfers during the close season, Financial Fair Play and also owner Marcus Evans having seen that spending large sums of money doesn’t necessarily bring success under previous managers.

“Marcus has gone through the whole gamut of managers and players, spending fortunes on players and getting nothing, but at the moment he feels at ease, as I think we all do, with the signings we made this year."

He says Town have made a conscious effort to get current players tied down: “There have been a number of negotiations and extensions to contracts and all the players we’ve got are on quite decent length contracts.

“That’s a nice confidence to have, that we have people on staff, so to speak, for some period of time.”

Despite newspaper reports to the contrary, Milne says there are no plans to further extend Aaron Cresswell’s contract with the left-back’s current deal stretching to 2015 with an option for a further season.

“I think we’ve comfortable with that at the moment,” he said. “He is an asset and I think he’s a future left-back for England. At this time he stays playing with us and he’s very happy to do so.”

Cresswell was linked with several Premier League clubs in the summer but none of them ultimately firmed up their apparent interest.

Would Mick McCarthy get cash to reinvest in his squad if the 23-year-old were to be sold in January? “There is money there. Clearly Marcus’s financial commitment is with the club.

"We haven’t had any bids and it’s difficult to speculate about that,” Symonds added. “We’re very pleased that he’s an Ipswich Town player right now.”

“If a player went, I’m sure Mick would be the first one to negotiate, ‘OK, that one [goes], I want money for that’,” Milne continued.

“There’s going to be a bargain going on there and Marcus would, forgive the pun, have to play ball with Mick on that. But you don’t know until you’ve got an active situation.”

Milne says manager McCarthy and owner Marcus Evans continue to be the men doing all Town’s transfer business: “Marcus and Mick do all the buying and selling and discussion on that. We stay out of that, although Marcus does talk to us about it.

“We, along with [club secretary] Sally Webb, get involved in the contractual stuff, but who comes and who goes is up to Mick and Marcus, and who plays is purely Mick.”

But they may get involved in the transfer dealing side of the club’s management in the future, Symonds adds: “If there’s a reason to do it, yes.

“Right now, Mick manages the team and we manage the business. There has to be a need for us to get involved, but right now it’s working very well.

“Mick has got a good team, he works directly with Marcus on that and there doesn’t seem any reason to change that. But if needs must, we will, of course.”

Photo: Action Images

Robbie12345 added 19:40 - Oct 17 That should be Mick tied down and the Ireland job out the window.. (Lets hope)
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Michael11 added 19:41 - Oct 17 Very coincidental that they've come out and said this just as Mick is linked with Ireland isn't it?! Maybe this is a way of trying to make him see we are serious about trying to challenge for promotion and give him a good reason to stay.
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Benters added 19:43 - Oct 17 I hope your right Michael
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PhilTWTD added 19:45 - Oct 17 It is entirely coincidence, I spoke to them yesterday but the meeting had been planned for a few weeks.
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ArnieM added 19:57 - Oct 17 I still want to see MM state unequivocally that he has no interest in the Ireland job. Until he does this or thry appoint another manager this speculation wil continue
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jas0999 added 20:02 - Oct 17 We heard the same thing in the Summer - but spent just £20k.
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TimmyH added 20:17 - Oct 17 Get Stearman on our books and a goalkeeper with a track record on loan until the end of the season - that shouldn't be too much to ask.
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Jimmy86 added 20:57 - Oct 17 Have to say i agree with Jas. Actions speak louder than words and the proof of the pudding is in the eating!! Fingers crossed though and especially if we still challenging at the right end of the table
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ericclacton added 21:40 - Oct 17 Come on you blues.
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warkonthewildside added 22:46 - Oct 17 Pascal Chimbonda (training with Carlisle at the moment) on a free, any interest from the blues do you think?
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dubblue added 23:08 - Oct 17 wow, just 20k spent during the summer! A commitment to spend in January hopefully will convince MC to stay.
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JimmyJazz added 23:47 - Oct 17 No interest in a better contract for Cresswell? Clueless
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WaffleMan added 02:10 - Oct 18 stearman and o'hara?
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stiff_talking added 06:21 - Oct 18 Either plea to keep Mick via promise of financial backing or Mick on his way and this is preparation against fans backlash that he left due to lack of financial backing. The article asked the wrong question, in saying would money be available via sale of Cresswell.... What the fans want to know is will financial backing follow without the unnecessary sale of Cresswell?

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blues1 added 10:35 - Oct 18 jas, know where ur coming from but the £20,000 ur talking about is in transfer fees. ive said this before(and for some reason got marked down for it), that while the other 10 players we signed commanded no transfer fee due to being out of contract, there is no such thing as a free transfer. every one of those players would have commanded a sizeable signing on fee. and would paying a transfer fee have made the players we signed any better? of course not. what we did was take advantage of there being a lot of players available who were out of contract. don't see an issue with that. jimmyjaz. how are they clueless over cresswell. he still has 2 years to run on his present contract with an option of a third so why would they be negotiating an extension now. maybe in a year they will(if he still here).

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