Blues boss Mick McCarthy says 17-year-old striker Ben Morris will benefit from his loan spell with Woking in the Vanarama National League, just as midfielder Kundai Benyu, 19, is from his ongoing stint at Aldershot.
England U18 international frontman Morris joined the Cards, who are fourth from bottom of the table, one point from safety, at the weekend and made his debut as a second-half sub as they drew 0-0 at home to Boreham Wood.
"I hope he gets his games, he got 15 minutes on Saturday and they’re in a bit of a scrap themselves,” McCarthy said.
"He’s a goalscorer and that’s what they were looking for. It is part of his development, even just training with somebody else. If he gets some game-time it would be brilliant for him.”
Morris has scored 12 goals for Town’s U23s, the most recent coming in Monday’s 3-1 defeat at Nottingham Forest, which has led to calls for the Colchester-born youngster to be drafted into the senior side but McCarthy says there’s a gulf between the two levels.
"Everybody should come down and watch the U23 games, everybody should go and watch them before [they say that],” he said.
"I know people sit at home and they see we have players go out on loan, Monty Patterson goes out on loan [to Braintree] and scores a couple of goals and people say ‘How can you let a goalscorer go’ and all that nonsense.
"Come and watch the U23s, go and watch the games they’re playing in and then come and see the difference to what they have to play in.
"Over the years, over the last 25 years, I’ve been a half-decent judge of whether they should be in and around the first team.”
Benyu recently had his loan with play-off chasing Aldershot extended into a fourth month having picked up two Shots’ Player of the Month awards while at the Recreation Ground.
"He’s doing great and he needed it, he needed to go and play and not in our U23s,” McCarthy added. "Going and playing against [National League teams].
"We’ve seen Lincoln, we’ve seen the standard of that league and how tough it is. Not everybody’s like that but they were big and powerful and strong and they’re a good team.
"And that’s what he’s playing against, he’s not playing against 17, 18 and 19-year-olds. It’s great for his development.
"And he’s not here either. He’s getting a different voice but one probably telling him the same things.”