Dean Gerken goes into Saturday’s crunch home clash with play-off rivals Nottingham Forest delighted that manager Mick McCarthy has stuck by him.
A stiff neck saw him sit out last month’s goalless home draw in which replacement Scott Loach turned in a man of the match display.
Like a number of supporters, Gerken admits he wondered whether McCarthy might give Loach the nod again for Town’s next assignment, the trip to face leaders Leicester.
Gerken said: "Scott came in and did brilliantly and I wasn’t sure if I was going to get my place back or not but the gaffer showed his faith in me.
"You can’t worry about what anyone else does or anything like that. You’ve only got to concentrate on yourself. Scott’s been a great professional, he came in and did his job and he’s been great with me since I got back in, just as I would have been if he had got the shout to stay in the team ahead of me.”
Gerken echoed the view of most, if not all, his colleagues that McCarthy is the straight-talking type who lets his players know exactly where they stand.
He added: "It’s a different ball game when you work under Mick McCarthy. You know what you’re doing.
"In football these days a lot of managers can be a little bit ‘Secret Squirrel’ — you don’t know what’s going on, like the ins and outs of things.
"But at Ipswich Town you know there are no grey areas. It’s black and white, which is the best way for me to work and it is obviously working for the other players as well.”