Defender Tommy Smith has stressed his desire to remain an Ipswich player after his present contract expires at the end of the season.
Academy graduate Smith, 25, signed as a professional in July 2007, a year after joining as a scholar, which makes him the club’s longest-serving player, and he is eager to extend his stay at Portman Road, having so far made 238 appearances and scored 23 goals. He also played 29 games in loan spells with Stevenage, Brentford and Colchester.
Smith said: "My contract finishes at the end of this season but the club have an option to extend that for a further year.
"My agent has been in contact with the club but Marcus [Evans] is away for a few weeks at the moment so there’s no real progress on that front at the moment.
"Hopefully my long-term future will be here. I’m enjoying my football and we’re being quite successful. We reached the play-offs last year and hopefully we will go one better this year. There’s no reason for me to want to move at the moment.”
By the summer of 2017 the New Zealand international will be eligible for a testimonial, a rare occurrence in football these days with few players spending a decade at one club.
But he added: "I haven’t even looked into that. I think this is my seventh season in the first team and obviously it would be nice if I could stick around for that long — or if the club will have me for that long — but at the moment that’s not in the forefront of my mind.”
Meanwhile, Smith has admitted he was taken aback to hear last month that Australian winger Tommy Oar, who arrived last summer via a five-year spell in Holland with Utrecht, had left Town.
He admitted: "It came as a shock to be honest. I didn’t see it coming myself and I thought he was just about getting adapted to English football after coming from the slower-paced Dutch game.
"He was starting to look really good in training and the gaffer was starting to bring him on to have an impact in games, so it was a shock at the time.
"I wish him all the best — he’s a nice guy and I hope he has a good future. He was a quiet lad who kept himself to himself but we tried to involve him in any group activities we had. It’s unfortunate he didn’t manage to settle but none of us have anything against him and all wish him well.”