Rotherham boss Paul Warne says he’d love loanee right-back Josh Emmanuel to return to the New York Stadium when his League One play-off winners return to the Championship next season but expects his one-time Millers team-mate Paul Hurst will want to keep him at Portman Road.
Emmanuel, 20, enjoyed a successful season on loan with Rotherham, who beat Hurst’s former club Shrewsbury 2-1 in Sunday’s play-off final at Wembley, carrying off their Young Player of the Year trophy and making 37 starts and one sub appearance.
"I’d like to keep Josh, he makes me pull my hair out at times, what little I have got, but he is great going forward and he is definitely exciting for a number of reasons,” Warne told Millers Time,
"He is a great kid. I can see Hursty thinking he will keep him, as I would. That will be the most difficult of the loans.”
Emmanuel, who Warne believes came on "leaps and bounds in the second half of the season”, says he enjoyed his time in South Yorkshire.
"This has been life-changing, every footballer wants to be playing week in week out and thanks to the gaffer and the coaching staff,” said the Londoner, who is contracted to the Blues until the summer of 2019 with Town having an option for a further season.
"It has been a great opportunity and I am so thankful that is has turned out well.
"We will see what happens, obviously I am an Ipswich player but I just want to celebrate now. [Coming back] is not really down to me, I just focus on my football, but I have loved my time here.”