Town boss Mick McCarthy says the Blues will be aiming for a top-six finish when 2017/18 gets under way on Saturday 5th August with a home game against Birmingham City.
"That’s where we’ll be aiming, we always do," McCarthy said when asked if the play-offs will be the target.
"We lost quite a number of players in the summer but it was probably time to freshen it up and I’d still like to freshen it up, whether we can move some out and get some more in [remains to be seen].
"I’m always optimistic, I always think we’ll be competitive. There will be teams, of course, coming down with how many millions I’ve no idea, there’s two from the previous year, Villa and Norwich, who have still got their parachute payments.
"That makes life difficult, Sheffield Wednesday threw money around last year, Derby as well.
"It’s become a really tough ask to get in it, but I guess if anybody broke the mould it was Huddersfield last year, so congratulations to them and everybody will be looking to do it like that now.”
Huddersfield now provide a blueprint for clubs such as Town, the Terriers having finished 19th in 2015/16 before winning promotion to the Premier League via the play-offs last month.
"It used to be Charlton,” McCarthy reflected. "I think they spent a few quid on players, I’d have to have that confirmed but they didn’t come for nothing, although I think they had one of the sensible wage bills.
"I thought they were brilliant, they were outstanding, they played some wonderful football, so I guess that is the blueprint for everybody - to play football like that, to get out of the league and get to the Premier League.
"But it won’t be easy. I remember 10 or 15 years ago everybody was trying to emulate Charlton and stay in the Premier League. Look what’s happened there.”
How different does he expect his XI which starts against Birmingham to be from the team which ended last season? "I’ve not given that too much consideration. But if you want to consider it now, Christophe Berra won’t be here. Tom Lawrence won’t be here, Toumani Diagouraga won’t be here.
"Jonny Douglas won’t be here, Jonny Williams won’t be here, Tom Lawrence is not here. There are a few missing. Whoever started our last game, there are going to be a few changes, that’s for sure.”
McCarthy, who took over as Town boss in November 2012, believes now is the right time to freshen up the squad.
"Without a doubt,” he added. "Some are always forced on you, others are necessity and some just run their course. It needs freshening up, definitely, without any doubt.”
Despite having been under fire from a significant section of fans throughout last season, McCarthy says proving people wrong isn’t something which particularly motivates him.
"I’m not really bothered about proving people wrong because I probably didn’t think they were right in the first place,” he insisted.
"I’d like to be in charge of a team that plays better football, which we had done over the past four years prior to last season, and have better results and please more people than we annoyed. I’m not so sure, it was probably 50/50 last year.
"I don’t enjoy that, but I not thinking I’ve got to prove people wrong because I’m not so sure they were all right anyway.”
What would help to turn Town from a team which finished 16th last year into play-off contenders?
"We certainly wouldn’t want to lose our best striker [shortly before the transfer window closes], that’s always going to be a bone of contention, although it turned out we got a good deal.
"We need to play better because I don’t think we played particularly well, but from Christmas onwards we were in a relegation scrap and it was a means to an end.
"And to be fair, that’s how it happened in the last few games when we beat Burton away and Newcastle here. We had to make sure we stayed in this league so we could fight again.”
With season ticket sales having dropped by around 15 per cent to just below 10,000, does he feel a sense of responsibility to persuade those fans back to Portman Road?
"I always feel a responsibility, of course,” he continued. "It’s a big responsibility on my shoulders to get the team to perform. And I’ve said, I don’t think we did last year. It wasn’t as exciting as previous years.
"From Christmas I’d recognise that we weren’t that good. It was a scrap, there’ll be a few fans who are watching Rotherham, Blackburn and Wigan who are going to feel a lot worse than ours do.
"But I get it, we have to play a lot better. We weren’t that entertaining and we’ll try to improve that this year.”