Boss Paul Lambert has confirmed that Leicester’s Callum Elder is imminently set to join the Blues on loan as cover for Jonas Knudsen, who seems set to depart in January with the Danish international’s contract up at the end of the season, a situation the Town manager says should never have been allowed to develop.
Asked whether Elder, who TWTD revealed on Saturday has been training with Town with a view to signing on loan, is indeed set to join his squad at the start of the window, Lambert said: "Yes. Obviously Jonas's situation has been well documented, he's in his last six months of his contract.
"Jonas's representatives and himself, they want to keep their eyes open for something else, which is fine. It's their prerogative to do it. But I also have to look at Ipswich, which is the most important aspect of this.
"Myles [Kenlock] has done fantastically well for us. We have to bring a left-back just in case Jonas does leave. But I've got to say Jonas has been great in training, his commitment to it is no problem. But also I've got to look at what can happen if he does go."
Does it make financial sense for the club to move Knudsen, 26, on now rather than risk losing him for nothing in the summer? "It depends the way the football club use it, whether they think money can come into the club or reinvest, or whether they think we can let him play here for the remainder.
"But I've also got to look at what's right for Ipswich Town. If he does go, and we only had one left-back, we're in trouble. But this situation should have been sorted well before I came in here.”
Lambert says he won’t be surprised to receive interest in Knudsen: "If you're going to be his agents then I think there probably will be a few calls.
"But nobody knows. And I'm pretty sure [owner] Marcus [Evans] is quite shrewd enough to say, ‘Well, if he is going to go, people are going to have to make it worth our while’. That goes without saying.
"Listen, I’m not silly, I know how the game works, I know exactly what goes around and what comes around, but I've also got to look after the football club which is the most important aspect. If somebody has got one eye on something else then we have to look.
He says no offers have yet been received for Knudsen: "No, not that I’m aware of at the minute but obviously Jonas and I had the discussion. And, as I said before, he’s been great with it.
"It’s just in the back of my mind that when somebody goes into the last year or the last six months of their contract they can do what they want.
"If anything happens I need cover there, I need help there. Whether somebody comes in, maybe. Somebody might not, I don’t know. I’m pretty sure Marcus will look at it.”
In the summer Middlesbrough and Stoke were both keen to sign Knudsen, while more recently Danish top two FC Copenhagen and FC Midtjylland have been linked along with Bundesliga side Fortuna Düsseldorf, whose fans will make their annual pilgrimage to Portman Road for the Rotherham match.
Lambert had previously indicated that he had recommended to Evans that Knudsen should be offered new terms but given Town’s position at the bottom of the table and seemingly destined for League One, the former Esbjerg fB man is hardly going to be in a rush to sign a new deal.
"He’s entitled to do what he wants because he’s in his last six months,” Lambert added. "Where it falls down is that this should have been taken care of with 12 months to go, he shouldn’t have been into the last six months.”
A number of Town players are in a similar position with contracts up at the end of the season - Dean Gerken, Luke Chambers, Grant Ward and Myles Kenlock among them although with the club having options for a further year in most cases - and Lambert says it’s important for the Blues to get players tied down rather than allowing them to get into Knudsen’s situation.
"The club has to, it can’t let people run it down or you keep having the same cycle where eight guys go, eight guys come in and you’re building team after team after team. It doesn’t work,” he added.
"It’s the wrong structure, in my opinion. If you keep on getting loans, loans, loans, loans, loans you may as well throw your money in the street, it’s not normal.
"The club has to have a stable base where it builds and you have maybe one or two loans, OK, no problem, but not too many that aren’t your own players. You can’t bring eight or nine players in in one summer, it’s sheer madness.”
The January transfer window is likely to end with the Blues having up to seven or eight players on loan but that’s more down to what's required to get out of the current situation than longer term planning.
"You could do,” he said. "It’s not normal, but we need help, not just one or two coming in, we need help and we need help from lads that want to be here, lads that want fight and win that battle. That’s what we need.”