Town boss Mick McCarthy will be facing one of his best friends in football when the top-of-the-table Blues take on second-placed Brighton at Portman Road on Saturday afternoon (KO 3pm). McCarthy and Seagulls manager Chris Hughton played alongside one another in the Republic of Ireland’s defence throughout the 1980s.
"He’s a fantastic fella,” McCarthy said. "He’s one of my real football buddies that I played with when I got into the Ireland team a hundred years ago.
"We’d be the ones that would be travelling over and spending time in the hotel. We used to always be talking football, himself, myself, Tony Galvin, Gerry Peyton, Seamus McDonagh. There was a good gang of us that were there and I’ve remained really close to him.
"I was speaking to him a couple of weeks ago. He’s a lovely fella and he had a great football career as a player but also as a manager as well.
"Similar to me, he’s had Championship teams and got them promoted and then lost his job and had to go and do it again, and he’s doing it again at Brighton. He’s second in the league at the minute, so he’s doing another great job.”
Brighton might be considered surprise early pacesetters having finished 20th last season. Does McCarthy believe they can maintain their challenge?
"Who knows? There’ll be Derby, there’ll be Middlesbrough, there’ll be Burnley, all their fans will be thinking ‘We’re spending money and we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that’.
"But it doesn’t work out that way. Bournemouth, of course, got promoted but they did spend a few quid, it wasn’t like they were ‘poor little Bournemouth’. They were the best side and they only got 9,000 in. Who would have tipped that?
"If you’re asking me to tip who is going to do well in the Championship this year, I think I’ll leave that one alone and just hope it’s us.”
Town will be without key defender Christophe Berra, who will be sidelined for four weeks with a hamstring injury, but McCarthy says he has players who can come into his side.
"Very much so,” he added. "In the first game at Brentford when Josh Emmanuel played he was excellent in that game, like he was on Tuesday night.
"Myles Kenlock has played well every time and Josh Yorwerth has been a real plus. I’ve been delighted with him at centre-back.”
Emmanuel seems set to make his second league appearance and his home debut at right-back with skipper Luke Chambers moving into the centre alongside Tommy Smith with Jonas Knudsen at left-back.
McCarthy confirmed that keeper Bartosz Bialkowski is back at the club having been in Poland following his father’s death last weekend and has said he will be in the squad. However, the Blues boss may opt to stick with Dean Gerken in goal with the Pole on the bench.
In midfield, Cole Skuse is again set to be partnered by Jonathan Douglas with Ryan Fraser on the left and Ainsley Maitland-Niles on the right.
Up front, McCarthy has a decision over which of his three currently fit strikers to leave out. Freddie Sears will probably get the nod with David McGoldrick and Brett Pitman both playing at Doncaster in midweek. Whether McGoldrick starts will depend on how he came through the 120 minutes against the South Yorkshiremen.
Daryl Murphy remains out with his calf injury and will miss Ireland’s internationals. The striker, along with midfielders Teddy Bishop and Kevin Bru (both hamstring), will be back after the international break.
Jonny Parr is not yet ready for a first-team return having been out with a thigh problem, while Luke Hyam is the only long-term injury having undergone knee surgery in the summer.
The paperwork relating to new Polish signing Piotr Malarczyk’s move isn’t expected to be done in time to allow him to play, while the deal to sign Australian winger Tommy Oar will be completed over the weekend.
Seagulls boss Hughton is delighted with the first few weeks of his side’s Championship campaign.
"From our point of view, it’s very good to be where we are and we’ve had a good start,” he told Albion’s official site.
"At this moment we are where we want to be and when you’re in a good position in the league, then you don’t want that to change.
"We wanted to be in a position where we could challenge that top six far more than what we were able to last season.
"But we know that there is an incredible number of good teams in this division. We want to stay up there, but that will be by making sure that we get good enough results to be able to do that.
"It’s certainly no surprise that Ipswich are right there. They are one of a group of teams that we very much expect to be up near the top of the table."
Defender Connor Goldson could make his debut having been cup-tied for the midweek defeat to Walsall, while striker Bobby Zamora could make his second debut for the Seagulls having rejoined from QPR 12 years after leaving the Sussex club.
Right-back Inigo Calderon is a doubt having missed Thursday training after feeling sore after the Walsall game.
Midfielder Andrew Crofts is on the way back after a knee injury but won’t be involved against the Blues.
Historically, Town have the upper hand, having won 30 of the games (27 in the league) between the sides, Brighton 23 (21) and with 13 (12) ending in draws.
The teams last met in January when Town missed out on the chance to claim the Championship’s top spot as they were beaten 3-2 at the Amex Stadium.
Sam Baldock put the Seagulls in front in the 18th minute, Daryl Murphy struck back four minutes later with his 18th of the season, but Joao Teixeira struck on 38 and in first-half injury time to make it 3-1 at the break. Sears pulled one back with his first Town goal with 12 minutes of the game remaining.
In September at Portman Road, second-half goals from Parr and Murphy saw Town to a 2-0 victory over the Seagulls. Parr stabbed home a rebound in the 79th minute and Murphy sealed the win two minutes from time.
Brighton keeper David Stockdale spent the first half of 2011/12 on loan with the Blues making 18 appearances and, having given his side’s last-minute winner against one of his other clubs Fulham a muted response, says he won’t over-celebrate in similar circumstances this weekend.
"It will be the same on Saturday,” he said. "They have all showed me respect and showed me a lot of respect when I have been there.
"With old clubs I feel that if the time is right to celebrate, perhaps if you haven’t had such good time there and have a point to prove, but Fulham wasn’t one and Ipswich won’t be another.”
Full-back Liam Rosenior was with the Blues on loan for most of the 2009/10 campaign making 28 starts and three sub appearances, scoring once.
Albion midfielder Jake Forster-Caskey is the stepson of ex-Blues and Seagulls striker Nicky Forster, while Town assistant boss Terry Connor was a player with Brighton between 1983 and 1987.
Town’s groundstaff will wear black armbands in tribute to Brighton groundsman, Matt Grimstone, who was killed in the Shoreham air disaster, while there will a tribute in the matchday programme.
Saturday’s referee is Keith Hill from Hertfordshire, who has shown eight yellow cards and one red in four games so far this season.
Hill’s most recent Town match was the 2-0 home victory over Rotherham last season in which he booked two opposition players and no Blues.
Prior to that, Hill’s previous Town match was the 4-1 derby defeat at Carrow Road in November 2010 in which he showed Damien Delaney a very harsh red card. A month earlier he was in charge of the 2-1 home victory over Leeds in which Alex Bruce, then with the Whites, was dismissed late on.
Town squad from: Gerken, Bialkowski, Emmanuel, Knudsen, Kenlock, Chambers, Smith, Yorwerth, Skuse, Douglas, Coke, Tabb, McDonnell, Maitland-Niles, Fraser, Touré, McGoldrick, Sears, Pitman, Alabi.