Keeper Brian Murphy says he’s making good progress having returned to reserves action after three months out with a broken ankle. Murphy, who is amongst those out of contract at the end of the season, kept a clean sheet as he made his second reserves appearance in the 0-0 draw with Watford on Tuesday.
The 27-year-old said: "I played my first game last Thursday and it’s good to get two games in the space of a few days.
"The ankle gets a bit stiff before the end and I’m half-expecting that, but it’s nice to be back playing again because a few weeks ago I thought I was a long way from playing again.
"The physios have worked very hard with me and it’s a case of getting a few games now, a bit of match time.”
Murphy, who joined the Blues on a free transfer from Dublin side Bohemians in January 2010, says it was a bad injury to suffer at a bad time, coming as it did only a few weeks before Paul Jewell took over from Roy Keane at Portman Road: "It’s never a good time to pick up an injury, it’s the worst injury I’ve had and hopefully I won’t have another one like it.
"The new manager’s come in and he’s seen the squad every day and I wasn’t there, which was frustrating.
"I’m trying to make up for what he hasn’t seen now and hopefully I can impress him between now and the end of the season.
"I know there are only a handful of games left and we’ll have to see what the manager’s thinking and hopefully I did a bit to push on against Watford.
"I don’t know how far away I am and I’ve set no target for the first team. Other people make that choice on what they’ve seen in training and with the ankle.”
The former Manchester City and Swansea man says that so far he is yet to be offered a new deal, although there are clauses in his existing contract which have discussed: "There’s been a few things but nothing that’s anything major at the moment. I’m sure it will all be sorted soon enough.
"I haven’t been offered a contract but there are different clauses and different things to be sorted. I don’t really want to say too much on that because I haven’t spoken to the manager regarding it myself personally. I’m just happy to get fit.”
Murphy says he wants to stay at Town and win a regular place in Paul Jewell’s side: "There’s a lot of potential at this club. I suppose it’s easy for anyone to sit here and say ‘It’s a great club with great fans’, everyone knows that, but we just haven’t been consistent enough in the year and a half that I’ve been here. We can’t seem to sustain a good run for too long.
"You want to play games at the end of the day. I’m nearly 28 and you want to be involved and you want to feel like you’re pushing for a first team spot. That’s not always going to be handed to you but you just want to feel like you’re involved in the squad.”
News on Murphy’s future could be known sooner rather than later with Jewell revealing his intention to talk to the keeper and fellow Irishman Colin Healy regarding their situations, having already spoken to fellow out-of-contract trio Damien Delaney, Gareth McAuley and David Norris: "I’m going to have a chat with Colin Healy and I’m seeing Brian Murphy this afternoon, but they’ve been really good professionals, the lads, really good people, so I don’t want to mess anyone about.
"I want to tell them the truth, tell them where we’re coming from and try and keep them in the picture.”