Blues co-owner Brett Johnson says he’s “cautiously optimistic” regarding the season ahead given the developments at Portman Road since the takeover in April.

Johnson admits he, his fellow Three Lions, Mark Detmer and Berke Bakay, and the other members of the new ownership have been given an easy ride up to now and knows their tenure starts in earnest when the new campaign kicks off.

“I think we are living in a honeymoon period here. As they say, the rubber is going to hit the road in August when we start to play and everyone gave us a pass, rightly so, for the tail-end of the season,” he told the Vertical Playpen podcast.

“Now we’ll start to be judged from August 7th and the home opener, August 7th from that moment on. That’s where it starts to get real.

“I’m such an optimist at heart and been very, very fortunate. I don’t take anything lightly relative to the challenge at hand, especially in League One, especially in England.

“But I’m cautiously optimistic that given the moves that we’ve made, bringing Mark Ashton in, having Paul Cook and his experience, I think those two are starting to make a very, very good team with each other and it gets me excited.

“I also think in a short period of time, Ipswich is now back on a lot of people’s radar screen. Players are starting to think that this is a club that’s on a move, I think other clubs are probably more interested now in terms of looking at maybe doing loans to us etc.”

He says Ed Sheeran’s sponsorship has also made a significant contribution in raising the club’s profile, particularly in the US.

“Ed Sheeran’s given an incredible boost over the last couple of months relative to his involvement,” he added.

“I was too busy to watch the England-Germany game, which I regret, I was travelling, but I understand in America they were talking about it on the broadcast. Stuff like that is fantastic.”

Photo: TWTD

Paddy39 added 10:25 - Jul 18 At last an owner who understands. COYB's.
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RegencyBlue added 10:28 - Jul 18 We now have some hope when there was none before!
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BotesdaleBlue added 10:39 - Jul 18 RegencyBlue - You sum it up in ten simple words perfectly. If we cut through all the positive changes that are happening both on and off the field, we get to the bottom line - "hope when there was none before". How good does that feel?
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Monkey_Blue added 10:48 - Jul 18 He says all the right things as does Ashton….I remember Evans said and Did all the right things, Putting HIS money where his mouth was for Jim, Keane and to a lesser extent Jewell. I'd love to be called the owner but get to spend other people's money. 😂
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Gforce added 10:54 - Jul 18 I am also in optimistic mode going into the new season.For the first time in many years we have real hope for the future,thanks to the new owners. I believe up to this point we have made the best signings in league 1 ,possibly along with Wigan.Hopefully there are more to come. Here's hoping we get off to great start to the season,and this time keep it going,third time lucky !! A bright new era has begun

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CavendishBlue added 11:08 - Jul 18 I haven't been as impressed with new leadership in our great club , since ironically when I met Marcus after 6 months in charge. We had a mutual interest outside of football and as chairman of this organisation we sat near to each other in the directors box and celebrated a disallowed goal together , before being introduced to him at half time. He was courteous , measured and honoured his word to me with regards to some local activity in the orgnisation that we were members of. Sadly his grip on the football club took such a painful death that it scars the memories of those heady days. This new crew appear to be in it for the right reasons. 1} To make money for the hard working key workers whose pensions rely on us. and 2) The hard working fans who support us and have had a failure of guardianship by someone who frankly should have known better. Keep the faith and COME THE TOWWWWNNNN!!!!

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trncbluearmy added 11:09 - Jul 18 His own money don`t think so The company of which he is the major shareholder who held the debt maybe The 3 lions have to justfy eveything they spend to the trustees (or American equivalent) of the pension fund who will monitor the spend far more closely then a faceless company.
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Karlosfandangal added 11:17 - Jul 18 There are a lot of fans who think we will walk this league this season. It will be hard and not certain we will do it this season. But Regency Blue has summed it up perfectly. It could well be like the George Burley time always in with a shout and entertaining football
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itfcasual added 11:44 - Jul 18 “Cautious optimism”, Brett has been attentive in his cultural assimilation.
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parhamblue added 12:14 - Jul 18 As far as the pass for the end of the season is concerned, yes given the decisions that were taken before the takeover.
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dirtydingusmagee added 12:30 - Jul 18 think the general feeling is one of optimism, however mustnt get too carried away, lets wait and see how things are going after a couple of months ,and we see if PC can get something out of HIS players, having failed with the ''old'' squad.[which to be fair were just not up to it] , Looking forward to the new season and era. COYB
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BeattiesBackPocket added 12:44 - Jul 18 Monkeyblue huge difference between the two owners there was a never structure set up under evans he winged it after not being able to buy the mirror and had a plan of promotion in his first 3 years so he could make his money back but was never prepared for ‘what if' then he hired a non football person in clegg to run the club. The new owners have a great CEO, chairman both of which have run football clubs before with some success and can give the best advice not some guy who helped win the Olympic bid who had nothing to do with football ever!! HUGE DIFFERENCE and if you really can't see that then I guess you know as much about football as clegg did 🙄

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Mark added 12:47 - Jul 18 Without question the new signings are of a higher calabre than the players we are letting go, most of whom are dropping to League Two. We are bringing in players their prime, physical players many of whom can score goals. We now need to complete the recruitment by strengthening the defence and wing play. I am optimistic it can be a promotion season, if we stay clear off too many injuries.

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arc added 12:50 - Jul 18 Yes, the words "Ipswich Town" were uttered during the US coverage of England-Germany. A proud moment... ;-) Someone please tell Brett to mind his metaphors–there are four in one short paragraph there!
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Bert added 13:23 - Jul 18 If we can't be optimistic now after years of treading water and then sinking, when can we ? Evan's did his best before his fingers were burnt but the set up we now have offers so much more in terms of collective expertise and enthusiasm. Whether it was right for Cook to say the under performers could all leave will be tested when a team is put together on the field. For now, if Ed Sheeran can put his hat in the ring and we can tingle with pride every time he is associated with us, that's good enough for me to believe we have momentum and a new era is about to start.

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Bazza8564 added 13:35 - Jul 18 At some point these guys will get over to PR, and we can maybe eventually sit down and have a beer with them and make them understand how much passion we have, and how grateful we are for their involvement. COYB
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warkie added 14:25 - Jul 18 Monkey you are a little teaser aren't you. Sometimes you make me giggle. But what amuses me most are championship managers who knows it all, and tells everybody who doesn't agree they know nothing about football. I really hope they are right and it will be good in the end. All we can do is wait and see for captain Hindsight to come to the rescue.
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karl1426 added 14:27 - Jul 18 As a loyal Town supporter, I certainly hope this will work out in the first time of asking! In honesty, I am quite disappointed how the new management has shifted out our very own grown youngsters! Not sure changing almost the whole team will work out? Despite the credentials Cook was brought in, I still think he failed in his first attempt to change the team he has inherited (almost all Championships qualities) despite having so many games to prove himself! Look at Chelsea's Tuchel, he was brought in without adding many players but still managed to gather Chelsea to even greater heights!

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BeattiesBackPocket added 15:12 - Jul 18 Karl1426 again if those players were good enough why are they now in league two? Or at much smaller clubs now? Only Dozzell has gone up the pyramid no one else has as yet?? Even the ones in the under 23's aren't attracting much interest accept from the likes of Cambridge mk dons etc so your case for getting better out of what we had doesn't add up
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BeattiesBackPocket added 15:16 - Jul 18 And regarding the youngsters who are you referring to? Unfortunately due to no fault of the new owners or management team anyone in the youth set up is taken from us with small compensation by bigger teams who are category one. Until we move to category one this will continue to happen Evans had a chance at the start of the new youth structure to become category one but didn't due to the expense of it all now we are paying for that. If the best of the best get taken from us then we are unfortunately left with those deemed not good enough by premier league clubs. We may get some gems still but it's become few and far between now. That isn't the management or new owners fault.

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Skip73 added 16:28 - Jul 18 Monkey, what a miserable, negative buffoon you are.
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shakytown added 16:56 - Jul 18 Karl1426. Championship quality thats a laugh. Why are most off to league 2 then????? Surely they would be snapped at a bargain or on a free.
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algarvefan added 17:33 - Jul 18 The great thing about optimism for the coming season, is that this year, we finally have some!! I'm so looking forward to the season starting, which I haven't for quite a few years now. Our relegation was a low point but now it's time to kick on and see where the future takes us, I'll admit to a few butterflies but I have faith in the new management and it's structure, still would like to see a few more players through the door, but on the whole the road ahead looks good. Good luck to all the lads and the staff and the ladies team too, lets make Ipswich proud again.

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grinch added 19:33 - Jul 18 He is correct let's wait for Aug 7th and possibly 10 games later that is when we can judge if this has been successful or another false dawn. We cannot just forget Cooks current record it is terrible no matter what excuses are made even Lanbert got more out of the players last season so he had a low standard to achieve and failed. Let's hope he can work with the players he has. he will not have any excuses as Co owner states honeymoon period is over

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Cakeman added 20:15 - Jul 18 I'm cautiously optimistic too but would be less cautious if we signed a couple of experienced centre half's. For me that's just about all that is missing as with all due respect the ones we have at the moment need serious competition.
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