Town boss Paul Jewell has revealed that he has spoken to former loanee Jimmy Bullard regarding a possible return to Portman Road. The 32-year-old, whose Hull City contract is in the process of being terminated, is also the subject of interest from Premier League clubs.
Jewell said: "I spoke to Jimmy yesterday. I’ve been speaking to him right through the summer. It was a deal we tried to do but Hull weren’t prepared to let him go out loan on a wage that we could afford. He almost had a deal set up at QPR in the summer.
"I spoke to him yesterday and he didn’t mention any Championship teams [being interested in him, as has been reported], but he said there are a couple of Premier League teams speaking to his representative.
"I told him to keep us informed because we want to be at the head of the queue if at all possible. He’s a player who did really well for us and we’d like him here if we could possibly have him here, if we could do it.
"But there will be a lot of teams after him. However, I spoke to him and asked him to keep us informed and keep us in the loop.”
The Blues boss admits that with Premier League sides chasing Bullard — Wigan, Blackburn, Norwich and Bolton were mentioned in this morning’s press — Town are very much outsiders: "Without being rude to us, I think he’d want to go to a Premier League team, anybody would.
"But he knows what it’s like here, he knows the set-up and he knows how we work. I know he enjoyed himself and all the players liked him and the fans loved him, so if we could do it at all we would.
"But as I said before, I’d liked to have signed Fabregas, but everything has a price, that’s life. If we can afford Jimmy, then we’re very, very interested and we’d like to bring him here.”
Jewell says he made two enquiries regarding Premier League players on Wednesday — one West Brom defender Pablo Ibáñez — but was again told to wait until after the transfer window closes.
Aside from Ãvar Ingimarsson, who is out for another two weeks with his thigh strain, the Blues have no injuries ahead of Saturday’s live Sky clash at Peterborough (KO 5.20pm).