Captain Luke Chambers says he and the rest of the Town squad were treated very well by their hosts at Fortuna Düsseldorf and wouldn’t be surprised of the Blues made the trip again during pre-season next year.
Chambers, 29, says he predicted the scoreline of last night’s friendly, the home side running out the victors by the odd goal in seven.
"Me and Kevin Bru were talking about what the score would be and he said he thought it would be 2-1 and I said in the lift on the way down that it would be 4-3, just having a laugh about it. He said ‘Never in this heat!’, but it turned out to be true,” he said.
"It was a great run-out, an entertaining game, like any game which ends 4-3. But we’re not looking at scores at the moment, it was a very tough game for us, our second game against a team that are in their third week of pre-season and are a decent team. It was good to be out there having a run around.
"The gaffer told us that they start their season next week after we came off at half-time. We’re looking at minutes on the pitch at the moment, so that’s another training session for us. It was quite enjoyable but it was definitely a hard work-out”.
The Blues skipper says the game was played in exceptionally hot conditions: "It one of the toughest 45 minutes I’ve had to play. The boys, especially the young boys, found it quite tough.
"But that’s what you need to get yourselves up. You can do as much training as you want but when it comes to playing a game there’s nothing that can recreate that. There’s something that we need and something that we’re prepared to do.”
The defender says the squad were given five-star treatment by Fortuna, who gave the Blues the use of their facilities at their main stadium, the Esprit Arena.
"The stadium’s something else, 45 or 50,000,” he added. "I think it’s a multi-functional stadium for concerts and they mentioned American football as well.
"It’s a lovely, lovely place, we stayed in the stadium and the bar area and restaurant, you walk out and you’re looking out onto the pitch. It’s just a lovely place.
"We’ve been looked after, treated very well and the way it’s gone so far we’ll probably be looking at doing next year, I’d imagine.
"They’ve looked after us really well, it’s a different experience and it’s especially good that we’ve got a few young players at the minute and it’s a good experience for them to come and play in places like this against opposition like this.”
Meanwhile, on-trial out-of-contract midfielder Darren Ambrose is understood to still be at the club despite not making the trip to Germany with manager Mick McCarthy keen to take youngster Kundai Benyu.
Left-back Jonny Parr also remained behind as his thigh was sore after last week's Ireland trip.