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Former Irish International Ward Training With Town - Ipswich Town News

Town have revealed that former Republic of Ireland left-back Stephen Ward will spend the next week or so training at Playford Road.

The 34-year-old Dubliner is a free agent having left Stoke City at the end of 2019/20.

"Stephen is with us for a little while,” Town’s general manager football operations Lee O’Neill told the club site.

"He’s training with us and will have a look at the club and we will have a look at him. It’s no more than that at this stage.”

Ward started his career with hometown club Bohemians before joining Wolves, then managed by Mick McCarthy, in January 2007 with then-Town boss Jim Magilton having confirmed that the Blues were also interested.

Ward spent seven years at Molineux featuring regularly in the Premier League before moving on to Burnley in 2014.

"After five further seasons in the top flight at Turf Moor, the 5ft 11in tall left-back or winger moved to Stoke last summer. However, he made only 17 appearances and left at the end of the season. Ward has been capped 50 times by the Republic of Ireland, scoring three times.

Town running the rule over Ward would appear to suggest that they are looking at alternative to former loanee Luke Garbutt, who the Blues are known to have pursued this summer.

However, the League One salary cap introduced on Friday has limited Town’s ability to add to their squad and the Blues management seem to have opted to move on to another target likely to demand a lower wage, despite reports over the weekend that a final offer had been made to the ex-Everton man, who is also interesting Sunderland.

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