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Lambert: Few Will Expect Us to Get Anything at Boro But Anybody's Beatable on the Day Friday, 28th Dec 2018 12:11
Town boss Paul Lambert knows few people will expect his team to take anything from Saturday's trip to Middlesbrough, but says anybody’s beatable on any given day.
The bottom-of-the-table Blues go into the game seven points behind 21st-placed Rotherham United with a goal difference six worse than the Millers’, while Boro are fifth despite having lost 1-0 to Sheffield Wednesday at the Riverside on Boxing Day and having won only one of their last seven in all competitions.
“Another game where a lot of people won’t expect us to get anything, but we’re playing well, I’ve got no worries on that issue,” Lambert said.
“We’re going there to try and give them a game. They’re probably one of the favourites to go up. Anybody’s beatable on any given day. We’ll have to be stronger in both boxes [than we were at QPR].”
He says the Blues will go into the match looking to play their own game and aiming for all three points.
“Everybody who knows me knows I won’t sit and wait, I’ll go and try and win,” he said. “I’m not going to sit and wait.
“I’m not going to play long ball football and all that sort of thing. We’ll try and play our game that we’re trying to make the identity of the club. It’s a long way before you actually put your blueprint on it but we’re getting there, but we need a little bit of help.”
Lambert confirmed he’ll look to shuffle his pack with the match Town’s third in eight days with the crucial home game against Millwall following on Tuesday.
“We have to, we have to be fair to the other guys as well and give them a run,” he continued.
“And that’s what we’ll try and do, try and be fair and it gets me to see everybody as well. And there are too many games to continue going with the same group.”
Among those who could be handed a start is Teddy Bishop, who was in line for a place in the XI for last week’s home game against Sheffield United until he fell ill.
“He’s just back from a virus, I was actually going to play him on Saturday against Sheffield United but he had a virus and he’s just come back in at the beginning of the week,” Lambert said.
If you're making the long journey up to Middlesbrough tomorrow, take a look at our away day guide for all the key information you need. 👇 #itfc– Ipswich Town FC (@Official_ITFC) December 28, 2018
“He should be [good to go on Saturday], he’ll be a good few days through it. Danny Rowe’s had it as well, there have been one or two little bugs there but Bish I think is a lot better.”
Reflecting on a holiday period round-trip of just over 500 miles, Lambert added: “You feel for the supporters, it’s a helluva jaunt up there. Our fans are brilliant, they really are. They came to QPR and got right behind us and even at the end they clapped the lads off.
“We have to give them something as well. They’ve been brilliant since we’ve been here and we need everyone to be together.”
Dean Gerken is again set to be in goal with the back four also likely to be unchanged with Jordan Spence and Jonas Knudsen the full-backs and skipper Luke Chambers and Matthew Pennington the centre-halves.
In midfield, with Cole Skuse sidelined for at least another month, Trevoh Chalobah is likely to stay in the deeper role while Bishop could come into the team for either Flynn Downes or Jon Nolan in one of the two roles ahead of the on-loan Chelsea man.
There will be one enforced change with Grant Ward out for around nine months with the ACL injury he suffered at QPR. Jack Lankester or Gwion Edwards will come into the team on the right of the front three.
Freddie Sears is likely to continue on the left, while Jordan Roberts may come back into the starting line-up for Ellis Harrison, who has started the last two matches having only just returned from injury.
For Middlesbrough, defender Ryan Shotton is a doubt with a knee injury, while striker Rudy Gestede, a Blues target, is not yet back from a hamstring problem.
Town have had the better of Middlesbrough over the years, winning 30 games (28 in the league), drawing 16 (16) and losing 22 (21). The Teessiders have won only one of their last eight league games at the Riverside.
In October at Portman Road, early goals from Mo Besic and Stewart Downing saw Middlesbrough to a comfortable 2-0 victory over Paul Hurst’s Blues.
Besic netted the opener on 12 and Downing added the second four minutes later following an error from Blues skipper Luke Chambers with Town never looking like taking anything from the match.
Last time at the Riverside Stadium, in December 2017, goals either side of the break from Martin Braithwaite and Patrick Bamford saw Middlesbrough to a 2-0 victory.
Braithwaite profited from a series of Town defensive errors to give the Teessiders the lead on 44 with Bamford adding the second with a low shot off the inside of the post six minutes after the restart.
Saturday’s referee is Jeremy Simpson from Lancashire, who has shown 93 yellow cards and four red cards in 23 games so far this season.
Simpson’s last Town game was the 2-1 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday in August in which he controversially red-carded Blues central defender Toto Nsiala and booked Knudsen, Ellis Harrison and two Owls.
Before that he refereed the 3-0 home defeat by Hull City in April in which he booked only Bersant Celina.
Prior to that game he had refereed only two Town matches in which he awarded a total of four penalties.
The 1-0 defeat at Rotherham in April 2017 which he gave a seventh-minute spot-kick when Josh Emmanuel bundled over Jon Taylor. Gerken saved Danny Ward’s kick.
Loanee Toumani Diagouraga was the only Blues player booked in that fixture, along with two Rotherham players.
@Official_ITFC fans going to Middlesbrough. This will impact anyone who is travelling back via Darlington after the game as the 1743 to Darlington is not running. Advice I have been given is to talk to ticket office at Middlesbrough station on arrival to discuss options. https://t.co/O9NLLvn19a– Liz Edwards ITFC SLO (@ITFC_SLO) December 28, 2018
Prior to that he was the man in the middle for the 2-1 defeat at Reading in September 2016 in which he notoriously awarded three penalties which led to the game’s three goals.
Danny Williams won the match with the third and spot-kick deep in second-half injury time, Knudsen having been adjudged to have hauled down Joey van den Berg at a corner.
In first-half injury time Ward had been harshly penalised for handball for the game’s first penalty and Garath McCleary put the Royals in front.
Brett Pitman fired home Town’s - also contentious - spot-kick five minutes after the break for a foul by Tyler Blackett.
Simpson also booked nine players in that game, five Royals and Knudsen, Chambers, Skuse and Christophe Berra.
anybody can beat anybody ,but thanks to Hurst and Evans they keep beating us. A miraculous point would be good against Boro .COYB .as a woman down the road once said, LETS BE HAVING YOU , COME ON .
Well said dirtydingusmagee. Spot on. Imagine the outcry if PL said "we are certain to go down, well over half the players are crap, Nolan's error cost us the game, Gerks should have saved it anyway, Spence is pants, how Knutson is an international I'll never know etc. etc."
Not sure that would help anyone.
Keep hoping folks, the cavalry are coing over the hill.
We are fighting for survival .Evans is like General, Melchett sitting in an office somewhere and sending our boys into the battle armed with Spud guns, [sorry for the many young supporters who dont know what they are / were , Paul Lambert is Black Adder. And Milne is Baldrick.
I love what you are trying to do for our club Paul Lambert, but yes, your right I expect to get nothing from a struggling Middlesborough side. We need a little bit of help and we need to get players in early he said when he 1st arrived at the club. Now I read in today's EADT that we may have to be patient and it maybe a long window. Time is not on our side and we'll now be left with players who are left over that come with old age/injury records or baggage that nobody else was prepared to take on. My earlier enthusiasm when Lambert 1st came and Evans hinted he would spend big to get us out of the muddle he helped to create has now vapourised.
Mind you miracles do happen and if we score first, Born fans would turn the stadium toxic.. Sheff Wed are woeful and were in freefall until Boxing Day..
Yes that's correct Paul but unfortunately not sure we've had too many of 'our days' - the wins against Swansea and Wigan were both a tad fortunate, Boro currently not playing well and I've said this before and proved correct when a team is struggling we practically always help them recover!
We all know deep down that we are going down, but what keeps me going is looking forward to being part of big travelling Town support going to some places and grounds I've never been to before and genuinely challenging for the League One title next season. There is a big difference in quality between Championship and L1 and if we can keep PL and he and Evans are sensible through the summer over who we keep and who we bring in then I believe we will bounce back as a much, much stronger club. Sadly we must endure another 5 months of this before we can start to get excited about what is around the corner. I actually think ITFC and PL are a very good match for each other and just what both need to rediscover better days. COYB.
We were so poor at QPR that i travel tomorrow with zero hope for the day or the season. I can see nothing other than a comfortable 2-0 defeat. I'd given up on survival a good month ago and doubted that we'd hit 30pts or even 30 goals. Most alarmingly for me though is that the current level of performance would suggest that this group of players will get nowhere near the div1 play offs next season. Whilst i like Paul lambert,the truth of the matter is that there has been no improvement under the new management whatsoever! Looking forward to the walk back to the car overhearing an opposing fan say..." they're the worse team I've seen hear this season" !!
I'm not suggesting for one moment Lambert should say we are doomed, that would be ridiculous. What annoys me is this repetition every week of 'a little bit of help' and we are playing really well. Clearly we need a shed load of help as we are adrift at the bottom of the league. Can we not be treated like grown ups and at least stop giving us the same chirpy nonsense. Perhaps Lambert could start by saying we have a real challenge on our hands and it is up to every player to step up and get us out of this mess. Does anyone who went to QPR believe we played well as he seems to think, it was a shambles. And now Lambert is saying he needs to change things around to give other people a chance and to see what they are like. Come on, really?
Anyone in the Championship is beatable, that there is no doubt. The problem is when we announce our starting 11, revealing our back 4. Opposition players start licking there lips. Wonder why this could be??
Eleven v eleven! Keep the faith! Boro don't fancy this either. I remember as a lad in the mid 70s seeing town lose at home to bottom of the table Luton! I can still remember the 50 Luton fans doing the can can in the North stand.It was a boxing day game and spoiled my christmas. COYB
Players and managers moan about too many games over the festive period, but it was just over fifty years ago they were playing Christmas Day and then the reverse fixture on Boxing Day! Add to that the heavy pitches real leather footballs that had laces in them and weighed a ton when they got wet, you headed one of them wrong and it would remove your eyebrows! And let's not forget the steel toe capped boots and it was never about the money either...those were the days!
Hopefully our group have recovered sufficiently enough to give a good show for the wonderful travelling supporters of ITFC.
can I just add that my first ever football was a leather one with laces, I got it from saving bubble gum wrappers from bazookas, took me forever to save the required number of wrappers, hated that dam ball, wish I'd picked the cricket bat instead!
Just hope tomorrow goes in some small way to removing the memory of Boxing Day! The travelling fans deserve that!
Well Lambert will never come out with a statement that says his players were s$£t, and demoralise them anymore than what they are already. He can safely leave that issue to others. It's his and our job to support the players at his disposal and try to get the best from them. Yes, we all know some are not up to it, but he only has what he has to work with. Perhaps some should take a leaf from his book. Me included on occasions. COYB's.
Midddlesbrough away will always be a bogey fixture to me. All but ending our chances of being crowned Champions of England season 80/81. To go alongside our proud reputation at the time of being no1 in Europe.
He's got to stay positive. He's the manager. And there is always a chance we will have another Swansea or Sheffield Utd match. Battered in both but won 1 and drew the other. Always hope in this game. Dodgy referee decision, own-goal etc and we could be competitive.
PL is really putting his credibility on the line with his talk about possible survival and "a little bit of help." Very brave really, because if neither of these, particularly the first, happens, he is left with his proverbial pants down. Then what does he say/do next? He can either walk away and say, "well, I did my best," or he can stay and rebuild. I sincerely hope he chooses the latter because his positive, inclusive attitude would be just what we need to galvanise fans in the great re-entry project. But then football doesn't always turn out as expected, so we will just have to wait and see...
Gerken and the same back 4 I don't understand. Just need Spence and Knudsen to concentrate and give 110% for 90 mins which is yet to be the case this season.
It hurts SO much to have to admit how dire we are. In my whole life, I've NEVER felt this pessimistic about Town. Do I still have hope? Yes, of course - why would anyone give up until we absolutely have to? Would I actually put any money on us staying up? Absolutely not... That last sentence is the most painful of all.
Surely Chambers and Spence can be dropped in come Nsiala and Donacien I'd stick Bart back in goal I've given Heroin a chance as I'm not a fan but he should have done a lot better with the goals against QPR and ok Nolan gave the ball away but the lad was a long way from goal at that point and we should have take control of the situation I'll say it again what have we got to loss changing up the defence we haven't been winning and who knows we might be a tighter unit with the changes to me Chambers is not a leader supposedly a good man in the dressing room that's great just don't put a kit on as I've played with a lot of guys that are fantastic for team spirit but can't play football So you don't play them let alone let them be captain!!!!!!! on the pitch but I'm positive every game that we will get a win every game as we can all see we have it there but need changes and additions for that extra kick
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