Town boss Mick McCarthy says he and his players have no problem with training on Christmas Day, believing it's something which is part of the job of being a professional footballer.
Asked about the Christmas training schedule McCarthy said: "The usual, we’re off [today]. Having worked all week they get a rest day and they will hopefully put their legs up and not be out Christmas shopping with their wives. And then we’re in on Saturday and Sunday as usual.
"It doesn’t bother me at all and I don’t think it bothers the lads, they fully expect to have to do it.
"I think the danger if you give them Christmas Day off is that it [should be] just like a normal Friday [ahead of] playing on Saturday, and if they don’t come in and they don’t train it’s just not normal. You wouldn’t do that on a normal Friday so they have to come in.”
He says training on Christmas Day isn’t particularly taxing and admits he used to enjoy it back in his day as a player.
"We don’t do a lot, but it really is getting them up out of their beds and probably getting them away from putting Action Man and Sindy stuff together, if they’ve still got Action Man and Sindy like in my day.
"I used to apologise to my girls and son Michael, ‘Sorry, I’ve got go’ and I couldn’t wait to get out of the house. I was driving down to the training ground thinking ‘Yee-ha, going to play football!’. It was great.”