Town begin their 2023/24 home campaign with a first-round Carabao Cup tie against League One Bristol Rovers on Wednesday evening on Portman Road’s new pitch.
The summer has seen extensive work at Portman Road to renovate the surface, which is now a hybrid of natural and artificial grass, and install undersoil heating and an irrigation system as well as a blue Astroturf trim.
The Blues, who got their season up and running with a 2-1 Championship win at Sunderland on Sunday, will make changes to the team facing the Pirates but will want to progress to the next round.
"My ambition in sport is just to try and get better all the time, try and improve all the time, the next game try and win the game, try and perform well and see where it takes you,” assistant manager Martyn Pert said at the pre-match press conference, which took place at Portman Road with the players training on the new surface for the first time on Tuesday morning.
"A difficult game tomorrow, try and get the result, try and perform well, try and perform well and see what happens there.”
Quizzed on whether the cup competitions are a distraction, Pert added: "Winning breeds confidence certainly and I think in regards to distractions, there are distractions all over the place in football.
"That’s the key to really focus in on what you’re trying to do on a day-to-day basis, there are loads of distractions all the time.
"This game this midweek, just focus on it and it’s another opportunity for players to come in and play and they’re improving as well. I’m looking forward to this game.”
Asked if was a chance for players who weren’t involved on Saturday to prove their worth, Pert says most of them have already done that during last season’s promotion campaign.
"I think the majority of players have been here so they’ve proved their worth to us as a football club time and time,” he said.
"I think it’s a good chance for some players to come in and get minutes because we’re still working on the conditioning at the start of the season.
"Some people haven’t played as many minutes as they’d like in pre-season in the games, so a good chance for them to get more minutes as well.”
Over the last few seasons, the Papa Johns Trophy has given players on the fringes a chance to maintain their match fitness. Thankfully, Town don’t have to take part in that competition this year, but a run in the Carabao Cup would help replace that facility for players around the first team to keep up to speed.
"I think just going into the game, you’re just trying to focus on this game and for the lads that come in, it’s a great opportunity to get some minutes in there and to play the game and we’ll just try and do the best we can in the game and see where it goes,” Pert added.
Bristol Rovers are familiar opponents, the Blues having faced Joey Barton’s side in League One last season.
Having won the Portman Road fixture 2-0, in which the Pirates were reduced to nine men, the Blues drew 0-0 at the Memorial Stadium in February.
While it was a frustrating evening at the time and led to words being exchanged between skipper Sam Morsy and an angry fan on the terraces, manager Kieran McKenna has subsequently cited it as an important result and away point, which led to the subsequent run of 13 wins from 14 matches which saw his side to promotion.
"Looking back, it was a particular moment where you can look back on,” Pert reflected. "It was a tough away game, I think it was after [the 2-2 home draw with] Sheffield Wednesday, so we’d experienced that game, which was massive in terms of adrenaline because it was a big crowd and how the game went - we missed the penalty, then we were 2-0 down and everything looked bleak at that point.
"And then we came back and it was 2-2 and after the game there had been huge adrenaline rush and you have a big crash because of the adrenaline in your body.
"And then you have to travel away and the stadium’s different, the conditions on the night were not great in terms of the pitch and looking back on it, it was probably a good point in the context of the season.
"But at that moment after the result, after the referee blew the whistle, it was 0-0 when we felt we really could have done with the win.
"But in the context of it, it was probably a good point and it was where we all stuck together and started to think, ‘Right, let’s just try and get better. Whatever happens, let’s try and improve every day, try and get better every day, try and become a better team, become a better coach’.
"That is always my mindset every day and I think that holds you in good stead if you just concentrate on what you can control and looking back now, it looks great, but that was the philosophy at the time. Yes, it was a big moment.”
Pert says he’s tried to steer clear of reflecting on last season and its success, preferring to eye the campaign ahead.
"It’s one of those things I’m trying to avoid doing because you’re trying to look forward all the time,” he continued.
"I suppose if you look back, there’s a sense of massive sense of joy and accomplishment from what we achieved as a club.
"Throughout the season how it manifested itself, I think it probably was as expected in terms that at certain points I thought it would be difficult because of the expectation of ourselves, the club and everything to achieve the goal that we wanted to.
"At points there were going to be times when you think ‘That might not be possible’ and then how do you then cope with it and deal with it as a group?
"And I think the ethos when we first came in was we always try and learn from every game, try and improve and try and make the players better every time, and that really helped us in the period after Christmas when we didn’t quite get the results that everyone wanted us to get, and we wanted to get.
"We were able then to kick on towards the end of the season by the players really dialling into trying to get better all the time.
"You just try and get better every time, that’s what we did and by the end of it, I thought we were really were one of the better teams in the league and we showed that in the last three months.”
Although the Blues have made four additions so far this summer, most of the squad is the one which won promotion and Pert says that is a plus.
"I definitely think continuity and stability in terms of how you communicate with the players next to you and how you communicate with different body language, and the stability and the structure and the way we play as a team, there’s definitely a benefit to having continuity and stability in the team,” he said.
"Obviously, you’re looking to try and improve all the time in terms of the players that you bring in, but you should never forget about the quality of the players you have.”
Wednesday’s match is the third of three in six days with pre-season training having given a good grounding with two trips to Austria and a lengthy domestic visit to Preston North End.
"I hope so,” Pert said. "You can’t really say at the moment, but you hope so. We’ve had a good six weeks of training, we had a block of two weeks in Ipswich where we trained really hard and then we’ve had that period of intense games where players were playing midweek and at the weekend so they’re used to that. Hopefully that robustness will be good for us.
"This week, you can’t get any more intense with three games in six days, so it’s an intense start to the season. Obviously you have the adrenaline of the first few games, which is helpful as well.”
It seems likely that Town boss McKenna will switch his entire team after Sunday’s long trip and match, and with Stoke in Suffolk in only three days’ time.
The Blues boss could well hand a Town debut to third-choice keeper Cieran Slicker, who joined the club from Manchester City in the summer, with Vaclav Hladky probably not risked given the Czech is the only fit keeper at the club at present.
Harry Clarke could start at right-back having got over his achilles injury and now available following his weekend suspension.
George Edmundson and Elkan Baggott may start at the centre of the defence with Greg Leigh at left-back.
Lee Evans is likely to skipper from the centre of the midfield with Jack Taylor, who would be making his Town debut, and Dominic Ball options to join the Welshman. Cameron Humphreys is likely to be among the subs.
Omari Hutchinson might well make his full debut on the right, although Kayden Jackson will also be hoping to come into the XI.
Hutchinson or Sone Aluko could be used in the centre with Marcus Harness perhaps on the left with Freddie Ladapo the number nine. Kyle Edwards is another option for the three behind the main striker.
A Town win would extend their all-competitions unbeaten run to 19 matches, closing in on the 20 achieved in the 1980/91 campaign.
Rovers manager Joey Barton, who won’t be at the match as he serves a three-game stadium ban after admitting to improper behaviour at Sheffield Wednesday last season, says he’s looking to use the cup competitions to help improve the depth of his squad while targeting reaching the final in the Papa Johns Trophy.
"We’ve got to build that secondary group,” he told BBC Radio Bristol's Having a Gas podcast ahead of the start of the season.
"To get a promotion out of League One, I think you need 18 to 22 players capable. Certainly when we're playing 46 league games, League Cup, FA Cup and Papa Johns now.
"So I do think there's games there, certainly in the early part of the season, to grow a kind of secondary group. Certainly Ryan Jones, Harvey Greenslade, Jerry Lawrence have benefitted from that.
"But again, I think if we want to do well in those competitions, and I think we do this season, we certainly want to try and get to Wembley if we can, why not? It would be great to take our fanbase there.”
The one-time England international added: "It would be nice to get a little cup run going, whether that's the Papa Johns but again we'll have a good team and hopefully the Gasheads will be excited to come and watch us home and away.”
Coach Andy Mangan will be in charge of the team at Portman Road and said the precise make-up of the team was still to be determined following Saturday’s 1-1 draw at Portsmouth.
"That's something we'll have to discuss,” he told BristolLive. "We don't know how the lads are going to deal with this game.
"We have to check their bodies, check what the numbers are, check if anyone's had any knocks. That's something we'll discuss over the coming days.”
The match will go to penalties if the scores are level after 90 minutes with the draw for the second round, which again is regionalised on a north-south basis, held at around at roughly 10.15pm on Wednesday evening live on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Football which are broadcasting the Burton Albion-Leicester City tie.
Historically, the clubs are well matched with Town having won more overall and Rovers most often in league competition. The Pirates have won 15 (15 in the league) games between the clubs, nine (seven) have been draws with with Town victorious on 17 (11) occasions.
The teams last met in League One in February at the Memorial Stadium when Town dropped to fourth following a frustrating 0-0 draw with Rovers.
The Blues dominated the first half but without creating enough opportunities, then after the break were scruffier with both sides having chances but with the home side going closest to breaking the deadlock when Scott Sinclair saw a goalbound effort turned against the post.
In September at Portman Road, Conor Chaplin and Evans were on target as Town comfortably beat nine-man Bristol Rovers 2-0 to stay top of League One.
Chaplin hit his sixth of the season on 24 in a brilliant Blues spell in the first half, then Evans added the second 10 minutes after the restart with the Pirates having Bobby Thomas and Alfie Kilgour dismissed in the latter stages.
Earlier in the half, Town had lost Cameron Burgess to the facial injury which saw him require surgery and the insertion of more than 30 screws.
The sides most recently met in the Carabao Cup at the same stage in 2020/21 when Town ran out 3-0 victors in an opening day of the season game at Portman Road, Freddie Sears scoring twice and skipper Luke Chambers once. That game remains the Blues’ most recent win in the competition.
Previously, the teams met in the competition in 2012, again at the first round stage at Portman Road, when the Blues won 3-1 with Jason Scotland, Tommy Smith and Aaron Cresswell on target for Town and Michael Smith for the Pirates.
Last season, Town exited at the first round stage having been defeated 1-0 at home by Colchester United.
Former Blues midfielder Grant Ward joined Rovers during January after leaving Blackpool.
The 28-year-old made 75 starts and 23 sub appearances for Town between August 2016 and May 2019, scoring eight times, including a hat-trick on his debut having come on as a half-time sub. The Londoner has made two starts and one appearance as a sub for the Pirates.
Ex-Blues centre-half James Wilson joined the Pirates in the summer after leaving Plymouth. The Welshman spent two years at Portman Road and was named the Town Player of the Year in 2020/21 before being released that summer. In total, he made 47 starts and two sub appearances, scoring twice.
Winger Luke Thomas, who moved to Rovers from Barnsley in the close season, was briefly on loan with Town in 2020/21, making four starts and one sub appearance.
Wednesday’s referee is David Rock from Hertfordshire, who was in charge of Barnsley’s 7-0 hammering of Port Vale on Saturday during which he showed eight yellow cards.
Rock’s last Town match was the 4-0 home victory over Wycombe Wanderers in April in which he booked four Chairboys and no Blues.
Prior to that he was in charge of another 4-0 victory, on that occasion over Morecambe at Portman Road in January, in which he booked Evans and two visiting players.
He officiated in the 1-0 home victory over Plymouth in March last year in which he yellow-carded winning goalscorer Morsy, Wes Burns and one Pilgrim.
Rock was also the man in the middle for the 2-2 home draw with AFC Wimbledon in August 2021 in which he awarded the Blues a penalty after Burns was felled by Will Nightingale, booked Hladky and three of the visitors.
Before that he was in charge of the 3-3 pre-season friendly draw at Colchester in July of the same year, as well as the 1-1 draw at MK Dons in October 2020 in which he cautioned Flynn Downes and two home players.
Prior to that, Rock’s first Town fixture was as a replacement referee in the 3-0 defeat at Watford in March 2011.
Having been the fourth official, Rock took over from fellow Hertfordshire whistler Grant Hegley in the 10th minute after he had suffered a hamstring injury, showing yellow cards to two Hornets and no Blues.
Squad from: Hladky, Slicker, Hayes, Clarke, Donacien, Ball, Woolfenden, Burgess, Edmundson, Baggott, Davis, Leigh, Morsy (c), Evans, Luongo, Taylor, Humphreys, Burns, Jackson, Chaplin, Broadhead, Harness, Aluko, Edwards, Hutchinson, Hirst, Ladapo.