Town defender Luke Chambers has called for club owner Marcus Evans to back Mick McCarthy in readiness for an anticipated promotion push next season.
Chambers, 27, wants nothing more than for Ipswich to retain their Championship status over the current campaign’s remaining five games and then to put the Premier League firmly in their sights next time around.
Certainly, if Town can stay up and start the new season the way they have fared since McCarthy took charge back in November the future could be very bright indeed.
Chambers said: "Since the gaffer has come in we don’t fear anyone. If the league started then we’d be something like fourth in the table. It’s a very, very big positive for us to get ourselves over that finishing line this season and look forward to next season.
"If the owner is going to back the gaffer now is the right time because the proof’s in the pudding with our results. From my experience there are not many better than Mick McCarthy and he’s been fantastic for every single player since the day he arrived.
"With the run we have been on since he took over there is plenty of cause for optimism next season. If we can keep the majority of the squad we have now, and add one or two, I don’t see why things will be any different next season to how they’ve been recently.”
Like so many of his team-mates Chambers, signed last summer by Paul Jewell after the expiry of his Nottingham Forest contract, has revelled under the management of McCarthy.
The defender added: "He’s definitely up there with the best I have worked under. Everyone the gaffer has brought in, even those who were not playing before he arrived, they have all performed.
"Whoever he has signed on loan he has come in and performed. We’ve been fortunate that everyone, for some reason, has turned their personal performances around and week in, week out, they are performing as sevens or eights out of ten.”