Luke Woolfenden has revealed how the difference in the Town dressing room, from the 3-1 win over Burton to the goalless draw against Cheltenham three days later, was like night and day.
The 23-year-old defender, born and raised in Ipswich and a Portman Road season ticket holder long before he became a professional footballer, has been ever-present in the team’s three-man backline since new manager Kieran McKenna arrived to take charge towards the end of December.
On the eve of tomorrow’s trek north to Morecambe, Woolfenden said: "On Tuesday when we drew it was a completely different dressing room to how it had been after we beat Burton on the Saturday.
"Everybody was disappointed that we didn’t manage to get the goal that would have got us the three points. We can take the positives out of the performance — it wasn’t as if we didn’t create chances, it was just that we didn’t put them away — but we were obviously disappointed not to take all three points.
"The two games were different but we didn’t play badly. We started well against Burton and then probably had to defend for the next 15 minutes or so. There were a lot of corners and long balls into our box, which we dealt with well, and we ended up seeing the game out quite comfortably.
"We were pretty comfortable the whole game against Cheltenham and they didn’t really cause us too many problems. It was just down to a lack of ruthlessness from us that we didn’t get the three points.”
Manager McKenna, in his post-match press conference, touched on the fact that fatigue had played a part in Tuesday’s outcome and Woolfenden was asked to describe the feeling of going in at half-time without having taken any of a large number of chances created over the preceding 45 minutes.
He added: "It probably is an issue when you go in at half-time after playing as well as we did without managing to score even one goal. The fact that it’s still nil-nil can be a bit of a flattener but you can’t let it affect you. You just have to keep going and work hard at trying to make the breakthrough.”
The result leaves ninth-placed Town four points adrift of the play-off places, a gap they remain confident in being able to narrow over the space of the season’s remaining 12 games, so how keen are the players to learn how their closest rivals in the chase for a top six slot have performed?
Woolfenden said: "To be fair we are more inclined, first and foremost, to reflect among ourselves on our own performance and then, once we’ve done that, we’ll find out the other results and see how they have affected us in terms of our league position.
"Where we are at the minute, we have to focus on ourselves and what we are doing more than anything else. The old saying — anyone can beat anyone in this league — applies and while people may look at our games and say we should win the majority of them, in reality it doesn’t work like that.
"The opposition are always going to do their best to make it tough for us. It means you must make sure you turn up each and every time or you risk being punished if you’re not at your best.”
The one major positive from the stalemate with mid-table Cheltenham was that Town equalled a club record of five clean sheets on the spin, while it was also their eighth shut-out in McKenna’s 11 games at the helm, an amazing defensive record.
Reminded that in their first six games of the season the team conceded a whopping 15 goals, Woolfenden continued: "The confidence has steadily grown and we’re a settled unit at the back.
"But it’s defending from the whole team — pressing from the front, the midfield being compact when we don’t have possession and the guys at the back also doing their bit. Christian Walton has also been in top form in goal.
"There’s no doubt being part of a settled back three helps us all, in terms of knowing our own individual roles and also understanding the part our teammates play. There’s a real desire to defend as well, it’s a part of the game we all enjoy more than anything else.
"It’s like the season has been flipped on its head when you compare our recent defensive record to what it was over the opening few weeks.
"Back then we were struggling to keep a clean sheet, yet we seemed to be scoring for fun, and now it’s probably gone the opposite way a bit.
"In the final analysis, we’re still creating a lot of chances, just not putting as many of them away, yet we’re defending better as a team than we were back then. If we can get the balance right between now and the end of the season we’ll be flying.”