Luke Chambers watched last week’s FA Cup stalemate against Lincoln from the Portman Road directors’ box — because he wanted to avoid the possibility of clashing with fed-up fans.
Chambers sat out the game because of a knee injury and decided against taking up a seat in the stand to ensure he didn’t become the victim of abuse from supporters eager to take out their frustration at the club’s miserable run of form.
The club captain said: "I was in the directors’ box and it looks a lot easier from up there. I was thinking ‘Next week I’ll do this, I’ll do that’ but we’ll see when it comes to Saturday.
"I sat in the directors’ box because if I’d been sat anywhere else I probably would have got into an altercation.
"I didn’t hear too much sitting there because the people there are pretty mellow. But yes, I can hear it and see it, and it’s very difficult at the moment. But what can you do? We can only change it as players by improving our performances.
"We won’t achieve anything by arguing or having disagreements. I’ve never done that in my career, argued with a fan, and I never will.
"They pay a lot of money to come and watch us and this is the entertainment business so they need to be entertained. We need to stand up and be counted, and improve ourselves — quickly.
Chambers doesn’t deny the players have a problem performing at Portman Road in what has become an increasingly toxic atmosphere this season, adding: "It’s very difficult. Obviously, people aren’t very happy and I don’t know how many it is but it seems like a quite a lot. We’re just trying to do our best.
"But it’s impossible not to hear it. At the end of the day we’re humans. I think we handle things better than anyone coming in who’s just been playing parks football. I think we have to because we’re used to positives and negatives, but it’s very difficult at the minute.
"I can’t criticise anyone for having their opinion on football, what they’re watching or the team. That’s going to happen because it’s football and when things aren’t going well, for whatever reason, people have an opinion.
"They might think we should be in the top six, but just because we were near the top six last year and in the top six the year before means absolutely nothing when the new season starts.
"If teams are investing like you are seeing — the top 10 or whatever — it’s almost showing now. We made the play-offs a couple of years ago and we’ve not really moved forward from there in my opinion.
"At the end of the day we’re all normal guys, normal people who have families and we’ve all got things away from football. Football’s our job and we are paid a lot of money, so we need to be able to stand up, take it and get ourselves through the difficult times.
"We can’t be shying away from it — we’re having a tough time and we’ve got to stick together, which I think we always do and always have done.
"I’ve had a part to play in that. The boys are a very, very good group — they’re honest and it’s not through lack of trying. We’re all trying to do our best to get ourselves out of this pretty crap run we’re on. We need to continue to do that.
"It was an opportunity for me to watch a game from a different angle last week. It was a very different experience for me, having played most of the games for the last few years.
"Lincoln are flying and they came here with absolutely nothing to lose, enjoyed their day and almost got what they were after.
"We managed to get something out of the game and give ourselves another opportunity to give a proper account of ourselves on Tuesday night.”