Town boss Paul Hurst says this week’s training camp in Spain gives him the chance to learn about the players’ characters.
Hurst, assistant Chris Doig, new fitness coach Nathan Winder and Chris Skitt, who joined the physio staff from Shrewsbury last week, have been working the squad hard at the Pinatar Arena Football Center, San Pedro del Pinatar, near Murcia.
"[This is] for me to get a first impression,” Hurst told iFollow Ipswich. "We had last week, but this is a tough week, three sessions [a day] starting with the run in the morning and it’s interesting to really see people’s characters.
"When things are going well and things are easy, everyone can play. I’m looking for people who can I rely on when the going gets tough, who is going to go in the trenches with us because we’ll need that over the course of the season.
"I think this week’s training is starting to highlight those things to me. But I have to say in general the lads have worked extremely hard and we’re now at a point where they’ve got two sessions [on Thursday], then an afternoon to themselves, which I’m sure they’ll be grateful for, before we go again on Friday.”
🎥 | Go behind-the-scenes at our training camp in Alicante as we caught up Town boss Paul Hurst after yesterday's third session of the day 👇 #itfc pic.twitter.com/1pEf6Hkkq0– Ipswich Town FC (@Official_ITFC) July 5, 2018
Among those in Spain are Emyr Huws, Teddy Bishop and Dean Gerken, who all missed the latter stages of last season due to injury, and Kane Vincent-Young, who is a free agent having turned down a contract with Colchester.
Hurst, who so far has signed Trevoh Chalobah, who turns 19 today, on loan from Chelsea and free agent former Crawley winger Jordan Roberts on a permanent basis, says the process of looking to add to the squad has continued during the week away.
😅ðŸƒâ€â™‚ï¸ #itfc pic.twitter.com/QIsJ71Gk7S
— Ipswich Town FC (@Official_ITFC) July 5, 2018
"The phone’s busy, looking at players,” he added. "[Head analyst] Will [Stephenson]’s out here as well, helping on that side. We’ve got people back home working hard and, in truth, it never really stops.
"We try and focus on the training when possible, give the players the attention and then in between get on the phone and pick up conversations and see if there’s been any progress made.”