Blues boss Paul Cook says he wants to see Town scoring more goals and playing on the front foot, believing that they currently don’t find the net enough and don’t create the chances they should.
James Norwood and Troy Parrott have been the strike pairing in recent weeks with the 18-year-old on-loan Tottenham youngster playing behind the former Tranmere frontman.
"I thought Troy Parrott was probably nearly just about our best player on the day,” Cook said reflecting on Saturday’s display at Gillingham.
"I thought he worked ever so hard. But a lot of his work at times is misguided and done in the wrong areas and I think we really do lack partnerships on the pitch.
"I’ve always been brought up in teams having left-back and left side of midfield, two centre-halves, two centre midfielders and those partnerships have to be allowed to flourish.
"We are really mindful of the fact that Troy’s 18, we’ve got a young lad playing, the volume of games, so it’s important we factor everything in and we get people in the correct slots and where they’re looking to play.
"At the minute we have a couple of imbalances in the team. That’s not a criticism of anybody or what’s gone on [before], it’s just the fact that what we’re searching for at the minute is that magic formula that will see us have a team that performs well, plays well and wins a game.”
Cook reiterated a point that he’s already made on a number of occasions that the Blues’ squad, 46 professionals plus six loanees, although with five players out on loan, is too big.
"It’s difficult when you have so many options, it’s really tough because when you get beat, the natural thing is to chop and change teams,” he said.
"And that’s football today, but if you look at the majority of teams at the other end of the table, they’re very consistent in both results and team selections and it’s something that we’ve got to search towards.
"At the minute, whether it’s right or wrong, we had a good little run, that was there for everyone to see. But previous to that results weren’t really consistent at all.
"So the bigger picture for me says that in our league performances, there’s criteria there which are there for all to see.
"The goals scored column for me is not good enough and going forward, irrespective of what damage it will do to the team, I need to see more goals in Ipswich Town. I don’t want to watch us defending deep. I want our fans to know we will play off our front foot and we will get after people.”
Town have scored only 36 goals in their 31 games so far this season, the 18th highest in the division and 20 fewer than top scorers Hull City.
Asked further about the squad being too big, a comment he made after Saturday’s match, and what an ideal number to work with might be. Cook said: "As you guys know, you guys have been in the media for whatever length of time you have, post-game for managers is not a good time.
"I speak more nonsense after games. I listen back and think to myself, ‘why are you saying that?’ because you have to make excuses for why you've been beaten.
"And the brutal truth is, again you're going back to pre-season and clubs having a clear plan and pathway.
"Having squads of our size, in my opinion, for whatever reason it's been put together, its number is too many and it's something that we will address as we go forward.”
Cook admits it’s difficult to find time to work on the training ground at present with matches coming with such frequency.
"You just can’t,” he said. "The first two or three days in the job were probably as manic as I've ever had in my career.
"The reality when lads are travelling home from Accrington and getting back at three or four in the morning on Wednesday and the time you're getting into Thursday, is that you're not training.
"It's the same for every club by the way, and this is why pre-season for football teams is so important.
"Pre-season is where you do all of your basic groundwork for what's ahead and for us at the minute, and certainly for me, it's about identifying a style of play and getting the best out of the group of players that we have, getting a formation that suits them all.
"Because I think it's there for everyone to see that we don't score enough goals, we don't create enough chances and sometimes for a manager that can be difficult because you'll chop and change, sometimes you want to give the personnel more time.
"But like every good team you have to have a supply to score goals and I feel that's something that we've got to get better at.”