Boss Roy Keane says the Blues have no interest in selling 17-year-old striker Connor Wickham. Tottenham have been linked with bids of up to £8 million for the England U17 international frontman with Keane confirming that the club has received offers for some of his "most important" players.
Keane told Ipswich Player that as far as he’s concerned Wickham is going nowhere: "Like we said last season, Connor is very much one for the future. We believe he is going to be a top, top player. He’s had a very good end of season, he’s been away with England, but Connor’s very much part of our plans.
"From the club and the owner’s point of view, we have no interest and aren’t under any pressure to sell him and that’s good news for everyone because we need players like Connor to produce next year if we are going to have a successful season.”
Keane admits that there have been offers for players he doesn’t want to sell, probably the likes of Wickham and skipper Jon Walters, strongly linked with Stoke once again, but says there are no moves in prospect for members of the squad who are out of his plans: "We’ve had a number of phonecalls and one or two offers for what I would class as our most important players, who we have no interest in letting go.
"But there’s no news on the players that we feel are surplus to requirements. There have been the usual phonecalls, but unless we get an offer for any of our boys, they’ll be back in and they’ll be part of the squad and might get another opportunity.”
The Blues are yet to make any summer signings and Keane says no formal bids have yet been made — despite reports of offers of up to £4 million for Cardiff’s Michael Chopra — although the Blues boss confirms that owner Marcus Evans and chief executive Simon Clegg have spoken with various clubs: "We have been linked with lots of players and I think particularly strikers, but we have not bid for any players. I think there have been a lot of talks between the owner, the chief executive and other clubs.
"I think everyone is being a bit cagey at the moment, it’s the same for every club. I think the deals which have gone through with Championship clubs have been players whose contracts were up.”
The Town manager hopes that new players will start to come into Portman Road sooner rather than later: "We’re no nearer to signing any players, but hopefully that will change over the next two or three weeks.
"I said at the end of the last season that patience is the key word for everybody and it’s the same for supporters. The most important thing is that we get the right players and again the right characters and if we have to wait two or three weeks, then we’ll wait.”
Town start their pre-season training programme on June 28th.