Boss Mick McCarthy has confirmed that there has been interest in left-back Aaron Cresswell but remained tight-lipped on whether the Blues have received any firm bids. Southampton, West Brom and a host of other Premier League sides kept tabs on the 24-year-old last season and have continued to be linked during the summer.
"There’s interest,” McCarthy admitted. "If there had been any bids I wouldn’t tell you. But I can’t deny there’s interest in him and there’s always going to be interest because he’s a good player.
"I said all last season that there may come a time when we can’t do anything about it because he may feel he’s done his time here and he wants to move on and better himself.
"If that’s the case and the deal is right, then it becomes an irresistible force. Well, you can stop it because he’s under contract but if you’ve got a bid for a player that everyone seems to think is fair and he wants to move on it’s a difficult one to stop. But if there ever is a bid it’ll have to be the right one.”
He added: "I said last season, and my stance hasn’t changed, Cressy got all the plaudits for being the best left-back in the league and if at some stage somebody comes in and the deal’s right, it becomes untenable because [in those circumstances] the player wants to go. It’s not that we want to sell him but I might be able to reinvest if that’s the case.
"I don’t want to sell him but he himself is really ambitious and if the right deal comes along, who knows, it may have to happen.
"And if it does, I’ll shake his hand, thank him for all that he’s done and I’ll crack on and get somebody else. That’s the way it happens.”
If Cresswell, who is contracted to Town until the summer of 2017, were to move on this summer his former club Tranmere Rovers would be entitled to 20 per cent of the profit the Blues would make on the £420,000 they paid for him following his summer 2011 switch to Portman Road.
A Football League tribunal set a compensation figure of an initial £240,000 plus milestone clauses, with only a £100,000 payment on promotion to the Premier League not triggered.