Ipswich loanee Aaron Mclean has laughed off the controversy surrounding what he insists was a misinterpreted Tweet soon after his arrival on loan from Hull.
Mclean shared his thoughts on an unsuccessful clothes shopping experience in the town centre with his 15,000 Twitter followers and didn’t hold back, stating: "To say the shops are dead is an understatement.”
The striker, who was also less than complimentary in a series of further comments subsequently removed from the social media website, later apologised for his remarks and was keen to emphasise, when the subject cropped up as he looked ahead to Saturday’s home clash with Barnsley, that no offence was intended.
Mclean, 29, said: "That was just a bit of banter about the town centre. I’m probably one of the trendiest players at the club and all my comments on Twitter are always light-hearted.
"I like to interact with the fans and have a bit of banter with them. Nothing I say on there should be taken too literally. It’s brilliant, Twitter, but I know a lot of players who don’t go on there because at the end of the day you are putting yourself out there and there are one or two people who are always going to have something negative to say.
"But you find that in all walks of life. It’s about using it in the right way, which I think I do. I try to speak to as many fans from different clubs and different places as I can and I always respond to people.
"There are those who will try to trip you up and you have to make sure you are aware of that. A lot of it is common sense. If people can see your personality through what you say on Twitter then they’ll take things as a joke when they are meant to be taken as a joke — like the shopping incident.
"If you go on there and you are respectful the majority of the time, when something like that happens it will be taken with a pinch of salt.”