Peterborough United chairman Darragh MacAnthony says the management vacancy at Town is a dream job which could attract bosses who otherwise wouldn’t consider dropping out of the Championship and ponders whether Derby's Wayne Rooney might potentially be a reasonable target.
Speaking on his The Hard Truth podcast, MacAnthony was asked whether he was surprised to see Paul Cook sacked by the Blues at the weekend.
"I’m not shocked, you’re getting up to Christmas now, they’re 11th, they struggled in the cup on Saturday,” he said.
"Obviously behind the scenes [CEO Mark] Ashton wants them to win the league, he wants them to win promotion. They’ve spent heavily, they’ve invested heavily.
"You know yourself how you’re playing, do you look like winning? Is it too inconsistent? What’s going on at the training ground? What are the vibes?
"But obviously Ashton’s under pressure, a big group have bought that club, they’re expecting to get out this year. How far are they away from the top two positions? All those things start coming in.
"January’s coming up, do you trust him again to go out and spend more money and bring more players in? What a job that is for somebody.”
He added: "I think because they brought so many players in in the summer, I don’t think it’ll be a case of going out and signing another 10 players.
"So what do you do? Who do you go after? Who’s out of work out there? Who’s been fired in the Championship that you think maybe can drop down and do a job and do well?
"I don’t know. It’s a big club and they’ve got deep pockets. Any of those clubs, Sunderland, Sheffield Wednesday and Ipswich, if any of them lose their manager, you’re going to have some top, top managers applying for those jobs.
"It will be interesting. Could you go and attract a John Terry for that job? Could you, I don’t know, go and get Wayne Rooney from Derby? He’s done really well at Derby, [could you] bring him to Ipswich? Could you be that ambitious. I can’t speak for them. I don’t know what he’s thinking.”
Dubliner McAnthony, 45, believes the job is attractive enough to interest bosses who otherwise wouldn’t look outside the Championship.
"There are not a lot of jobs,” he continued. "There are 72 jobs in the Football League. If you’re somebody who is out of work for a period of time, how long do you want to wait to get back into work? A club like Ipswich, it’s a dream job, it’s an absolutely unbelievable job. I don’t know.
"If my manager, say for example, if he was out of work and we were speaking and I had a manager who was doing really well, I’d be saying to my manager you’ve got to be in for that Ipswich job. That’s a helluva job, one of the biggest clubs in England as regards outside the Premier League.
"You look at their fanbase, you look at the size of them, you look at the new wealthy owners. It’s a dream project for somebody. You look at the squad and you think any good manager could go in there and get them going.
"As we know in League One, five or six wins on the spin and suddenly you’re flying. That’s a helluva job.”
Meanwhile, in the betting, former Millwall boss Neil Harris is now an evens favourite for the job ahead of ex-Waterford manager Marc Bircham at 7-4.
Frank Lampard, who we understand is unlikely to be interested in the role, is third-favourite at 4-1 but with no significant developments in the market.
Elsewhere, former Blues management target Jack Ross has been sacked by Hibernian after two years at Easter Road.
The 45-year-old Scot was a leading contender for the Portman Road job in the summer of 2018 but was named boss at Sunderland before then-owner Marcus Evans had made a decision with Paul Hurst eventually getting the role.