Town defender Tyrone Mings admits he is still pinching himself after the way his life has changed dramatically in less than a year.
Mings was plucked from non-league Chippenham Town, where he combined playing with working as a mortgage broker, to land a full-time deal at Portman Road.
A former Southampton academy kid, Bath-born Mings admitted: "I think about it every single day. I wake up and think how grateful I am to have been given the opportunity to be a professional footballer.
"I still speak to people I was with at Southampton and people I’ve known on my journey from school. There are people playing non-league football who feel they should be playing at a higher level and all you can say to them is ‘Keep going’.
"I never really had a mentor — no one really has a mentor coming out of non-league, they just want to work hard and get an opportunity, which I was lucky enough to get.”
Mings stood in for the suspended Aaron Cresswell at Blackpool on Saturday and is set to deputise again when Leicester visit Portman Road on November 23rd and the left-back completes his two-match ban.
That will be his fifth first-team appearance, but his first at home, and he added: "I’m looking forward to that, playing at home in front of our crowd. It’s just one of those things that my appearances so far have all come away from home.”
But before that Mings will use this week’s international break to catch up with his old mates during a trip home to the west country.
He said: "I still look to see how my former clubs, Yate and Chippenham, are getting on and how the league is progressing.
"I can’t say I ever experienced international breaks when I was at non-league level. It will be good to have some time off, although now that I’ve got an opportunity to play I’m not sure if that is a good thing or not.
"I’ll have a look to see who Yate and Chippenham are playing and also fixtures involving other guys I played with who have moved on. It will be good to catch up with some old friends.
"I don’t have any of them asking me to put in a good word for them with the manager here at Ipswich. Anyway, I’m just trying to worry about myself at the moment. I wouldn’t want to recommend someone and then they come in and take my place!”