Town have confirmed the signing of veteran centre-half Richard Keogh from Blackpool, the seventh addition of the summer.
Keogh, who is 36 on Thursday, comes into the squad as experienced cover on a one-year deal, a move which will allow the Blues to send fellow Irishman Corrie Ndaba out on loan. We understand Scottish Premiership Kilmarnock and League One sides Burton and Fleetwood have all shown interest.
Essex-born Keogh was at Playford Road as an academy player having joined the club aged eight and was a ballboy before being released and moving on to Stoke City’s youth set-up in 2003.
"It’s amazing to be back,” Keogh told iFollow Ipswich. "I started my football journey here and I have so many memories from my early days, so I can’t wait to get back out on the Portman Road pitch in front of the fans.”
Manager Kieran McKenna added: "Richard is a fantastic addition to the group. He is respected in the dressing room and has been through the highs and lows in football. He will be valuable to us over what is a long season.
"His experience at club and international level is great, and he can still contribute having played a good number of games with Blackpool last season. He is an intelligent player and reads the game very well.
"He had a little niggle not too long ago, but is fit now and will join up with the group immediately.”
Keogh, who will wear the number two shirt with Town, spent a spell with Icelandic side Vikingur on loan during his time with Stoke and having failed to break into the first team with the Potters moved on to Bristol City in 2005.
Loan stints with Wycombe, Huddersfield, Carlisle and Cheltenham followed before he joined the Cumbrians on a permanent basis in 2008.
Two years with Coventry followed from 2010 before a seven-year spell with Derby County, where he was skipper and played alongside Blues first-team coach Lee Grant, which ended acrimoniously when he was sacked in the wake of the car crash in which former Blues loanee Tom Lawrence was found guilty of drink-driving.
Keogh, who suffered a knee injury in the accident which sidelined him for 15 months, eventually won an employment tribunal which deemed that he had been unfairly dismissed and Derby were ordered to pay £2.3 million in compensation. He spoke about the incident and subsequent events in a lengthy interview with The Guardian last year.
TWTD revealed that Keogh, who was capped 26 times by the Republic of Ireland, scoring once, was interesting the Blues in the summer of 2020 after his Rams exit but he eventually joined the MK Dons.
After six months he moved on to Huddersfield and then last summer to Blackpool with whom he made 28 starts and three sub appearances in 2021/22. He has missed both the Seasiders' opening fixtures with a groin injury, suffered in a pre-season friendly against Everton.
We understand the move is a deal that the Blues have been working on for a while - it's believe two offers were turned down - with Keogh set to come in in purely a playing role with no involvement in coaching despite speculation along those lines.