Town boss Mick McCarthy was pleased with his side’s performance as the East Anglian derby between the Blues and Norwich City ended 1-1 at Portman Road but was disappointed they didn't claim all three points. Cameron Jerome put the visitors ahead of 26 but Jonas Knudsen equalised in first-half injury time.
"You’d expect it to be [a bit of a scrap], wouldn’t you?” McCarthy said. "But there was a lot of quality in there as well, it wasn’t just a scrap, from both teams.
"We were the better side. I think we played well, I think we had a really good performance. I thought we were solid for the main part, we just let our guard down after 20 minutes and they got in. But they’ve got a lot of quality in their team.”
Regarding Jonathan Douglas’s disallowed goal, which replays showed was onside, McCarthy added: "I haven’t seen it but I’ve just been speaking to the lads at Sky and they said there was a suggestion from their pundits that it may have been onside.
"I said, ‘Make your mind up, it’s either onside or it’s offside’. I live in a fairly black and white world and they decided it was onside, so if that’s the case, I’ll be battering PGMOL’s [Professional Game Match Officials Limited] door down again on Monday morning with a tirade of, ‘Is there any chance of us getting a decision?’.
"No I won’t, I’ll be doing it tonight, leaving an answering machine message. We’ve had two in a week, we’re owed a little bit. Maybe we’ll get the decisions back over the season. Let’s hope so.”
McCarthy was delighted with the way his team had began the game: "We had the ball in the net, didn’t we? Sadly disallowed, but it was a good start.
"I’m really pleased with the performance, especially as a week ago I was sat in the press conference at Brentford and I’m really angry and annoyed about a second half in which when we conceded we looked like conceding another, and we did.
"We were certainly different today, we were more resolute and tough and played very well.”
McCarthy was pleased for Jonas Knudsen that he had scored his second goal for the club, although was surprised that it came via his right foot: "I didn’t buy him for that because it’s akin to my left foot.
"He was unlucky at the far post just beforehand because he and Murph got in one another’s way.
"A really good performance from Jonas. It’s nice for him. He does all the dirty jobs well, he gets up and down, he works hard, he puts his head in, he puts his tackles, in he’s a proper grafter.
"It’s nice for him to get a bit of love for scoring, especially against Norwich, it’s lovely.”
The game’s other contentious decision was referee David Coote’s decision not to penalise Tim Klose for tripping Daryl Murphy in the second half with the striker looking to be in on goal.
"We appealed for it,” McCarthy said. "I thought he caught him and I think the big fella coming off has said that he got away with one to some of the lads.
"And then strangely enough we got a right wishy-washy freekick about 35 yards out after that. But I don’t know. I’d have to see it for me to really say.
"That’s my thoughts now, I thought maybe he got away with one. I might look at it tomorrow morning and think the referee’s got it spot on.”
Overall, despite facing one of the division’s favourites, McCarthy wasn’t satisfied with the point.
"I’m disappointed we didn’t win,” he continued. "Somebody just asked me, ‘Did you do enough to win the game?’, well quite clearly we didn’t, what a stupid bloody question. No, because we didn’t score two goals.
"But I thought we played well enough but didn’t manage to get the goal, so the performance was good enough but we just didn’t have that second goal in us.
"But they’re a good side and are bloody hard to beat and all, by the way. They’ll be a team up in the top all season long, I think.”
Asked whether the encouraging performances against Wolves and Norwich will have instilled some enthusiasm amongst fans, a clearly irked McCarthy retorted: "I get sick to death of us playing one bad half and we’re all s–t and we can’t play and the manager doesn’t care, ‘Get somebody who cares’, and I’m a boring c–t, somebody called me last week.
"I wished he’d called me to my face on my own because his pint of lager, he’d have been wearing it, let me tell you.
"So I heard the comments and, let me tell you, if that’s what they think about me and my team, well they’re sadly mistaken.
"I’m not having that, I’m not having that all of a sudden now we’re great this week. We’ve got to play Preston on Saturday, a team we’ll be expected to beat because they’ve not had a great start, although they beat QPR yesterday.
"And after that we’ll all be great guys again. Do me a favour, let’s just be consistent about it. It really does irk me that, up and down like a fiddler’s elbow. I’m all right one week and I’m not the next. Generally, I’m pretty consistent myself.”
Norwich manager Alex Neil was disappointed with the way his team started the game and admitted that they didn’t do enough to claim the three points.
"We had the better chances but our play didn’t deserve the victory,” he said. "We didn’t play the ball as quickly as we can and they were happy to let us have it in front of them. Unfortunately we weren’t good enough on the ball.”
Neil, who said he hadn’t seen a replay of the disallowed goal, was unhappy with the way his team conceded Knudsen’s goal.
"It was a good finish but a rubbish goal from our point of view,” he said. "We had a corner and I was thinking this is a chance to get a second goal but 45 seconds later they had the ball in our net.”