No one enjoyed England U21s’ 5-0 thrashing of their Lithuania counterparts at Portman Road this week more than Town loanee Ryan Tunnicliffe.
Tunnicliffe was among the 17,000-plus crowd as several of his Manchester United team-mates and former colleagues featured in a one-sided contest that extended coach Gareth Southgate’s winning start in his new role.
Central defender Michael Keane and ex-Crystal Palace winger Wilfried Zaha, along with former United youngster Ravel Morrison, who is now starring for West Ham, were all in from the start.
Morrison put England on the road to victory with an early finish from close range (above, centre) and later scored a superb individual goal en route to being declared Man of the Match.
Tunnicliffe said: "It was a great performance and it was nice to catch up with a few mates from Old Trafford. Apart from the lads who started, Jesse Lingard was on the bench and I also knew some of the other lads from playing against them all my life. It was good to see them do so well.
"Personally, I think Ravel can be as good as he wants to be. I’ve been saying that since I was 13 or 14 years old. He’s probably one of the best natural footballers I’ve ever seen in my life.
"The world’s his oyster, really, as long as he keeps his head screwed on and carries on playing. Now that he’s in the West Ham team and playing regularly he’s more concentrated on being more professional and it’s working in his favour.
"Everyone knows about some of the stuff that’s been reported but he’s a great lad if you get to know him. If you’re looking from the outside you don’t really know him but I’ve always been close with him and I think he’s a great lad.”
Tunnicliffe would like nothing more than to add U21 honours to the U16 and U17 honours he won earlier in his career — but his ambition doesn’t end there.
He added: "I’d love to be playing with Ravel and the others for the U21s. You want to play for your country, don’t you? All I can do is keep playing well for Ipswich and hopefully I will get the call. If not, I’ll still be working hard and trying to do my very best for Ipswich.
"It must be every player’s dream to play for their country in the World Cup and that’s one of my goals. I want to break into the U21s and go as far as I can with England. But that will mean playing well every week if I’m going to be in the senior squad.
"You look at Andros Townsend and he deserves the success he is having now. He’s bided his team and been on loan nine times from Tottenham, picking up useful experience in the lower leagues.
"He’s taken his chance at club level with Aaron Lennon being injured. In fact, he has taken it all in his stride and he was England’s best player against Poland on Tuesday night. He is so direct and he deserves everything he is getting now.”