Blues boss Mick McCarthy has refuted the “nonsense” suggestion that his Town team has played with the shackles on.
Quizzed on whether his players can now play with a bit more freedom and with the shackles off in the remaining five games of the season with the Blues having nothing to play for, McCarthy bristled: "There’s a bit of a misconception about having the shackles on because I don’t put the shackles on them.
"We put the shackles on the opposition but when we’ve got the ball we’ve got freedom to play and it’s a complete piece of nonsense that anybody should suggest any other way.
"So, stopping the opposition is one thing. If you had seen my team, which you have over the last five and a half years, we’ve played 4-4-2 when we’re attacking. We leave two centre-backs back and one sitting midfield player, which means we’re attacking with seven players.
"Both wing-backs here will be in the box. I’m going to refute that suggestion because it’s a piece of nonsense.”
McCarthy admits he would have liked to have had two flying wingers establish themselves in his Blues side as Michael Kightly and Matt Jarvis did at Wolves during his time at Molineux.
"Yes, I’ve tried, strangely enough two of the most successful ones have been Tabby and Ando, who were terrific, not flying wingers but able to still do the wide job but tuck in and make it hard for teams that are playing 4-3-3 to play through us,” he added.
"Tom Lawrence was a real hit, Ryan Fraser was a hit and Santie has scored his eight goals, so we’ve had a bit of success with them.”