David McGoldrick has admitted that last month’s home defeat by Derby County represented a massive turning point in the club’s season.
Since the Rams’ 3-0 midweek success — and despite what seemed a daunting programme — Town have remained unbeaten in four games, three of them against top six sides and the other against an Aston Villa side previously unbeaten at home.
It means Town will travel to Carrow Road on a high for Sunday’s live-on-Sky East Anglian derby against Norwich. McGoldrick said: "The boys are full of confidence. After the Derby game the boys were really down and I’ve not seen a dressing room like that in a long time.
"Credit to all the boys, the manager and TC [Terry Connor], we’ve stuck together. After that game, if you looked at the fixture list and those next four games you’d have thought ‘Jesus, where are the points coming from?’
"We’ve shown a lot of character to come out unbeaten from those games — and I think we could have got even more points.
"I’ve never doubted the ability of the boys here and it’s just nice that we’re now playing with a bit more freedom. People have just stood up and had to be men.
"In the Derby game we went 2-0 down early on and the fans were on to us. There was no hiding place.
"You need to want the ball, to go and play and show your ability. That’s what we’ve been doing. Boys have got on the ball and the improvements have come.
"It’s been really good football over the last four games — some of the best football, as a team, we’ve played in a long time.”
If the comprehensive defeat by Derby was hard for the club’s supporters, McGoldrick said he and his colleagues were also affected by it. He added: "It wasn’t a good day. I’ll put it out there — we didn’t look like we would score if the game went on for another 90 minutes.
"We all spoke in the dressing room afterwards and said ‘We need to stand up and be men now’, especially looking at the fixture list for February. We were back in the next day and were at it. We kind of thought ‘Wow, we don’t want that again’.
"It wasn’t a throw-things-around-the-dressing-room type of talk, but an honest assessment. We are all friends as well as team-mates at this club.
"The gaffer wasn’t happy and had his say. We were all speaking to each other individually saying ‘This can’t continue, we’ve got to show some steel and play’.
"When it’s not going well it’s easy to hide and just get through the 90 minutes. You have to get on the ball and make things happen — that’s what I believe.
"No one has hidden in the last few games. We’ve all been getting on the ball and have played some great football.
"It was like a new lease of life. We needed that first 30 minutes against Reading to get the confidence going again and results and performances have been good since then. If we continue doing that then we can have a real good end to the season.”
After his well-documented injury problems, not just this season but for the majority of his time at Portman Road, McGoldrick is just glad to be playing on a regular basis again. He laughed: "I don’t think I’ve been fully fit since 14 years of age! I do feel good at the minute, though. This is the best I’ve felt in a long time.”