Sub Ched Evans’s goal five minutes before half-time saw Fleetwood Town to a 1-0 victory over dismal Town on their first ever visit to Portman Road. The Blues were woeful in the first half but improved a little after the break but still rarely looked like equalising on a bleak and fractious night.

Brett McGavin was handed his league debut and Andre Dozzell returned to the side for the first time in two months as Paul Lambert made six changes.

McGavin was in the deeper midfield role behind Dozzell, whose last first-team game was the Leasing.com Trophy tie at Exeter at the start of January, alongside Jon Nolan, with Cole Skuse and Emyr Huws, starters during the 2-1 defeat at Blackpool on Saturday, missing due to a gash on the shin and a toe injury respectively.

Tomas Holy continued in goal with the Blues returning to a back three with - from the right - James Wilson, skipper Luke Chambers and Josh Earl the centre-halves. Janoi Donacien and Luke Garbutt were the wing-backs. Will Keane was up front with Alan Judge set to play off him.

Teddy Bishop and Freddie Sears were among the subs, having made their first starts of the season at Bloomfield Road, as were young duo Tyreece Simpson and Armando Dobra.

Flynn Downes missed the first game of his two-match ban for reaching 10 bookings and Kayden Jackson the second of his three-game suspension.

Fleetwood, at Portman Road for the first time in their history with manager Joey Barton in the stands serving a touchline ban, named an unchanged team from last week’s 1-1 draw at Sunderland.

Neither side threatened in the early stages with Fleetwood seeing most of the ball but without threatening. On 15 Paddy Madden shot well wide from the left of the area.

Moments later former Town loanee Callum Connolly was switched for Evans, back from suspension, the on-loan Everton man having been on the sidelines having a nosebleed attended to for the previous few minutes.

Chances continued to be non-existent at both ends with Fleetwood having most of the possession but without threatening and the Blues struggling to get on the ball. In their rare spells with it there were one or two neat interchanges involving Dozzell, McGavin and Judge but without getting near to creating an opportunity.

On 28 the visitors weren’t too far from opening the scoring in slightly fortunate circumstances when Barrie McKay was found in space on the left and his cross was diverted off the outside of the near post by Chambers from six yards.

Despite their possession, Fleetwood had threatened very little but in the 40th minute they went in front. McKay played in sub Evans who took it on in to the area on the left before hitting a shot beyond Chambers’ dive, across Holy and into the net.

The Fleetwood goal prompted boos from the previously sullen Town crowd, followed by chants of ‘you’re getting sacked in the morning’ aimed towards manager Lambert and ‘Marcus Evans, get out of our club’.

Fleetwood taking the lead seemed to wake the Blues up, Dozzell playing in Donacien on the right of the box but the right wing-back’s low cross was blocked.

In injury time, McGavin and Dozzell cleverly combined to find Keane in the penalty spot following a corner but the striker was crowded out before he could get in a shot.

The half-time whistle was greeted by more boos after a woeful first period from the much-changed powderpuff Blues.

Town, looking utterly bereft of confidence and dynamism, had struggled to get hold of the ball throughout the half with Fleetwood dominating possession although to little effect until their goal five minutes before the break.

It was little surprise that there was a change at the break after such a lacklustre half with Sears replacing league debutant McGavin with Judge moving back to the right of a midfield four with Garbutt pushing forward on the left.

The former West Ham man quickly got into the action, hitting a shot from the right of the box which was deflected over the bar after a well-worked passage of play down the right following a cleared freekick.

Town were looking a more threatening prospect in the opening minutes of the second half - although that wasn’t difficult given the pedestrian first period - with Sears making runs into channels and drawing one or two freekicks.

At the other end on 55 Lewie Coyle hit a low 30-yard shot in the aftermath of a corner which was straight at Holy.

As the game passed the hour mark Simpson was handed his home debut in place of Keane, who had had a tough evening with Fleetwood’s man mountain centre-half Harry Souttar having won everything in the air, something noted by the Town support in the Sir Bobby Robson Stand.

The Blues twice went within a whisker of levelling in the 63rd minute after Simpson had won a freekick on the left. Judge’s ball in from the left flicked off somebody and looked goalbound until it was cleared off the line by Coyle. The loose ball ran to Nolan, whose low shot was saved on the line by Fleetwood keeper Alex Cairns, his first stop of the game.

On 68 Danny Andrew shot through to Holy, then two minutes later Madden was booked for a foul on Earl.

Aside from the double chance, Town hadn’t seriously threatened and on 74 Bishop took over from Nolan.

Simpson, who signed his first pro deal with the Blues yesterday, wasn’t too far away from his first Town goal in the 83rd minute when he shot on the turn from a Sears cross from the right but his effort was too close to Cairns who palmed behind.

Town continued to look for a leveller as the game moved into its final scheduled minutes but with there being little sign that they would get back on terms.

Chants of ‘We want Evans out, we want Evans out’ rang round the Sir Bobby Robson Stand with the owner watching from the East of England Co-op Stand as the game entered five minutes of additional time.

Deep in injury time, Judge shot over after a freekick from the right had reached him at the far post as the chants aimed at owner Evans increased in volume.

The final whistle brought more boos and ended yet another depressing evening for the long-suffering Blues faithful with chants of ‘you’re not fit to wear the shirt’ erupting and the players and staff being roundly booed as they approached and applauded the Sir Bobby Robson Stand.

While Fleetwood, followed by 88 delighted fans, fully deserved their victory against a Town side which was simply not good enough to beat them on the night, a 1-0 defeat to a club which has spent most of its history well down the non-league ladder puts Town’s predicament into very sharp focus.

Fans brought up on the teams of Sir Alf Ramsey, Sir Bobby Robson and George Burley can’t ever have expected to see their side to lose and perform so poorly in a League One game against such historically lowly opposition.

Town, who have now lost six of their last eight and have won only four of their last 20 in the league, now look to be outsiders for even a place in the play-offs - they are six points behind tonight’s opponents who are now sixth with two games in hand on the Blues - having been top and looking to be cruising in November and after climbing back to the summit again in January.

Leaders Coventry, impressive as they won at Portman Road in the FA Cup in January, are next in Suffolk on Saturday.

Town: Holy, Donacien, Earl, Chambers (c), Wilson, Nolan (Bishop 74), Judge, Dozzell, Garbutt, McGavin (Sears 46), Keane (Simpson 61). Unused: Norris, Edwards, Woolfenden, Dobra.

Fleetwood: Cairns, Coyle, Andrew, Connolly (Evans 16), Souttar, Burns, Whelan, Coutts (c), Madden, Gibson, McKay (Sowerby 73). Unused: Crellin, Morris, Thervaldsson, Saunders, Holgate. Referee: Neil Hair (Cambridgeshire). Att: 15,678 (Fleetwood: 88).

Photo: TWTD

Henrietta_R_Hippo added 00:26 - Mar 4 Ooooppss! Sorry for some glaring typos above , particularly some recurring "a"s missing in manage or manager etc. ... but I did type this with a very painful FRESHLY broken wrist! (No you don't want to know how I broke it! LOL Let's suffice to say it wasn't while cashing my £ 1000 bet on precisely a 1=0 Fleetfooted win LOL)
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topshout added 01:11 - Mar 4 Any chance that we can field the ladies on Saturday? Would at least ply from the heart.....
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therein61 added 06:57 - Mar 4 That's that done then!!!!
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tractorboybig added 07:05 - Mar 4 Evans owns the club so we cant get rid of him. Lambert will not walk.Real supporters should bycott the games.
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atty added 07:10 - Mar 4 Every thing on here. Evans out, Lambert out, Evans our saviour,keeping us afloat, the McCarthyIt's. Surely our troubles start at the top. Yes ME saved us, but it wasn't a gift, and hasn't been since. The “club” now owes him £95million. Yes let's know he'll never get it back, but he could get something back if he called it in, and wound up the club. Anyway, what have we got for that £95 million? Nothing but survival as a football, a struggling football club at that. He's not going to increase funding fo4 players, and we're running an operating loss of £7/8 million a year, so we're living above our means. Without the handouts where would we be?

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thundercat added 07:12 - Mar 4 And what did Barton say after the match, you have to play with intensity, yep and there was town playing like they were having a kick about in Christchurch Park. Mick Mills comments on Radio Suffolk sums it up, the players looked if they had just met and did not have a clue what they had supposed to be doing. Will Town make the play offs and if they do what chance do they have of winning it, as it is now at this moment the answer is no and no chance.

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BildestonBlue added 07:22 - Mar 4 Im not the biggest Joey Barton fan but I think his interview before the game regarding Fleetwoods turn in fortunes speaks volumes about the intent at our once thriving club! In January they had no money to spend yet managed to trim the squad of 2 high earners and replace them with 4 up and coming players, that's ambition whilst working within your restrictions.... how can a club like Fleetwood be doing this and not us? where is the ambition and intent to improve and added to the club continuously? The Evans/Lambert Regime has nothing about is, boring, lazy and completely ignorant as to what this club needs to move forward. if relegation wasn't a catalyst last year then I really do despair, what needs to happen before they wake up? it neds to happen now before the club is damaged irreparably.

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Blueknight85 added 07:32 - Mar 4 Dozzel had a good game only midfielder who looked like creating something moving forward. Mcgavin was pinging some incredible long passes so would like to see him more but from the bench. Its clear Sears is out best striker still but respect that he needs to be drip fed back in i think Simpson looked good too so happy for him to be more involved from the bench, but causes selection problems going forward. Keane might not be scoring but he's been making most of the rare chances with his hold up play. With everybody fit they dont suite a front 3. Nolan can pop up for a goal but his general play isn't good enough. Bishop just runs and falls over or gets pushed no product. Defense as iv said all season is woeful we have both full backs and 2 centre backs playin in the opposition penalty box none of them can defend evan if they do get back and Calamity Chambo doesn't suite the last line of defense role

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budgieplucker added 07:36 - Mar 4 To be fair Lambert was a breath of fresh air when he arrived 15 months ago. He had us believing that the football would improve, we would play on the front foot. We all knew there were weaknesses in the squad, largely too many Division 1 (and 2) players in the squad not up to Championship standard. He recognised talented youngsters at the club and his enthusiasm for nurturing young talent. He reconnected the club with our past legacy and swelled the gates. Time would only tell if he was capable of turning this club around. We continue to have more than our fair share of injured players but a big squad to compensate. Dead wood still needs to be trimmed and we should expect a lot more from our experienced players. Actually I thought Andre Dozzell had a good game tonight having questioned him in the past for being too lightweight. Always kept trying to find openings and wanted the ball, not sure why @arnie thought he went AWOL. Lambert has too do much better, Evans has too do much better but whoever as a manager takes us forward has to clear the dead wood and look at bringing better less injury prone players with experience into this club. It does take 3-4 transfer windows to achieve this and to allow players contracts to run down to be able to be moved on.

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markytitfc added 07:39 - Mar 4 I fully agree we need a new owner, but Marcus Evans is clearly not lining his own pockets, official accounts show he keeps putting money in, al be it , not enough. He gambled with Roy Keane, Keane FxxxxD up big time, hence Evans investment failed. I guess he bought the club with a budget and plan and Keane blew it all on old mates, journeyman and any Irish player Sunderland didn't want! Evans biggest cock up was sacking Jim Magilton, then trusting dickhead Keane. He can only sell if he has a buyer ,OR , he could walk away and leave us like Bury, Bolton,Southend etc. Is that what we want? We can only continue to urge him to find a buyer,but, that wont be easy. Untill he does we will continue slide further down the pyramid. He has to sell and take the hit to his wallet. Simon Jordan step forward!

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therein61 added 07:39 - Mar 4 Be a good game Saturday called spot the crowd!!
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BcarefulwhatUWish4 added 07:52 - Mar 4 Season is over for us. I think if we did scrape 6th we wouldn't get promoted anyway. Too many teams that are stronger than us in this division. Finishing 9th or 10th is about right for this squad.
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ITFCsince73 added 08:05 - Mar 4 Finishing bottom half is about right....and that's where we will finish.
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carlgibbs13 added 08:39 - Mar 4 I am pretty sure that PL or ME never read this section or website. So the comments and bickering between ourselves will make no difference. Action is the only way. Boycott matches for the rest of the season. ME will have no choice but to take note. I appreciate we all love and want to support our team, but we are going nowhere. Boycott the remaining matches, its only 9 games, and ME will have a huge dilemma on his hands.

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Gazelle added 08:46 - Mar 4 What a relief that we're not going up and what a relief that we started the season we'll so we won't go down either. But.... a message to Evans, Lambert and Chambers. One or all of you is responsible for our plight. We have the best fans in the league and YOU have let us down. I suggest that you get this season over and then have a serious talk as to what you are going to do about it and let us know pretty quickly before you try to sell us tickets for next season. Sad to say this but you are a disgrace, I'll go back now to reading my 1981 book.

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Ipswichbusiness added 08:46 - Mar 4 Please remember that we started the season looking like the League 1 version of Liverpool. Now we are playing like relegation fodder. ME isn't responsible for that and the only significant injury is that of KVY (and possibly Norwood). Therefore, the fault would seem to lie with the manager.
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midastouch added 08:54 - Mar 4 Fleetwood were just 2/1 to beat us away tonight, that shows just how fall our stock has fallen under Evans. Imagine what price Fleetwood would of been to beat us away when Evans first took over! I said on the half-time page last night, I wasn't sure who was more unpopular after the match last night, Ched Evans or Marcus Evans! It's sad to see but very predictable. All the warning signs were there after a string of failures to beat the top sides in this league. Put very simply, we're just not good enough and as such drastic changes need to be made ahead of next season.

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londontractorboy57 added 08:59 - Mar 4 Bluebore with all due respect you are the last person to be criticising users about vocabulary and grammar with your over use and inappropriate use of exclamation marks full stops and question marks.
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londontractorboy57 added 09:01 - Mar 4 The only thing correct about last nights attendance was the 88 hardy souls from Fleetwood there was no more than 12,000 in Portman Rd last night. The sign of things to come from the fickle Numbskulls.
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Nobbysnuts added 09:04 - Mar 4 Well after that team selection either paul Lambert needs to be sectioned or he's still on delia"s payroll..........
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beornioblue added 09:38 - Mar 4 Match lost before a ball was kicked with that squad. No belief no passion not one f%&k given from the team. Criminal to hand a league debut to a young lad on a game like that and then sub him off at half time..confidence ruined already and he wasnt the worst out there in that half. The vast majority of that starting 11 can do one, we all could see better players on the bench even if theyre not performing they gave us a better chance hence the second half. Probably the worst performance ive seen a Town team put on it reminded me of the last Macarthy game against Barnsley even though we were chasing the game the ball was still going backwards and no one in the middle of the pitch wanted it !!! That is a huge missing section of the team. I dont want to go on Saturday and that tells me more about ITFC now than anything else will.

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KernewekBlue added 10:11 - Mar 4 The main problem we have is that, whoever is manager of this great club, he has to work for and under our clueless, shambolic owner, Marcus Evans. MAKE NO MISTAKE, Evans is the disease, Lambert is just another symptom of the Evans regime. Hypothetically, even if we could attract a manager with the Midas Touch like Klopp or Guardiola, they would undoubtedly fail here too due to the lack of investment, ambition and football knowledge shown by the owner. I'm not defending what Lambert does, how he's got us performing or how the results have gone (and will continue to go) but I think it's fair to say he (and we) would have fared much better with some timely investment in January to enable a big push for promotion. No decent footballing assets were drafted in because Evans wouldn't have it. Evans is too frugal and too short sighted to see the nose on his own face. Everything Evans does and doesn't do is a catalyst for our demise. It may only be a rumour but, I hear Marcus Evans' record of not parting with cash to make us competitive in League football has prompted the producers of "A Christmas Carol", which is to be performed in January 2021 in The Playhouse Theatre, Kidderminster, to offer him the part of Ebeneezer Scrooge. Like it or not, under this ownership, we are screwed! EVANS OUT!!!

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IpswichT62OldBoy added 10:22 - Mar 4 Freddie Sears is clearly p!ssed off with the whole thing, it came across in his interview and he seems the only one on the pitch actually trying. On our current trajectory local derbys against Cambridge Colchester are to be anticipated
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GiveusaWave added 11:02 - Mar 4 Frustrating being an Ipswich fan right now. Once every 3 or 4 games we see patches of play that make us think we could be a top six side.... But then we see patches of play that makes us think otherwise.... Why do we keep pumping the ball up in the air to Keane when he benefits from the ball at his feet? Why do we keep losing most (if not every) 50/50 challenge? Why does our defence part like the Red Sea once in a while? Why do we seem to have no idea what to do with ball? What is it with motivation at the club?

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midastouch added 11:02 - Mar 4 My dad doesn't know that much about football, he's not really a football man. But he said right from the start he doesn't rate Lambert. He also said to me on the phone this morning that O'Neill was on the local news last night and he told me we've got know hope with him as he said he sounded in denial about Lambert's 5-year deal and he was trying to defend the indefensible. While my dad doesn't know too much about the tactical side of football and which players are hot or not, nonetheless, he's had some very good management jobs down the years and he can usually tell when somebody doesn't have a clue when it comes to leadership and management. So in that regard, O'Neill and Lambert get the thumbs down from my dad and I have to say, usually when he passes comment on stuff like that, he's not too far wrong!

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