New boss Mick McCarthy says he wouldn’t have joined the Blues if he hadn’t hit it off with Town owner Marcus Evans. The 53-year-old was installed as the new manager at Portman Road earlier today.
"I’ve met him and he’s a really good guy,” he said. "An honest, straightforward guy, which I liked. If I hadn’t have done I wouldn’t have taken the job, actually.
"The last thing you need when you’re bottom of the league, with a malaise around the place and everybody struggling is to go and meet the owner and not like him.”
He says it doesn’t bother him that Dublin-based Evans isn’t always around the club: "He’s not a coach. He doesn’t do any massage! I want his support when it’s necessary, and I’ll have that.
"That doesn’t worry me at all. He’s a busy fella, but I think he supports his managers in the right way, by giving them the tools to do the job.”
McCarthy says he’ll assess the current squad before asking for cash for additions to the squad: "I’ve just walked in the door today, it would be wrong of me to start judging people after one training session.
"I’m hoping that I can turn it around with the players I’ve got and get a good feel about the place, get a result from somewhere that will give a bit of confidence back to everybody.
"I think with Marcus it’ll be a moveable feast - if it’s the right thing to do, I think he’ll back me on it, no question.”
Ultimately Evans, who has now owned Town for five years, wants to see the club in the Premier League, but McCarthy says there’s a considerable amount of work to be done before that becomes a reality: "Premier League? I’m talking about staying in the Championship for now.
"I think that the first job is to get them out of the bottom three and stay up, that’s going to be a task in itself.
"We’re a million miles away from [the Premier League] at this moment in time. That’s the ambition but I think we’ve got to get going forward first.
"We’re nowhere near that. That’s utopia for everyone that, the Barclays Premier League. It’s a long, long way away. Let’s deal with the job in hand.
"I want to manage there and I’m sure all the players want to play there, but there’s no chance at the moment, not unless we start pulling our fingers out.”