Interim boss John McGreal has spoken about the coaches working with him during his time in charge of the Blues, Rene Gilmartin, who was his assistant in his brief spell at Swindon in the summer, and Town U23s coach Kieron Dyer.

McGreal was appointed to his temporary role on Monday following Paul Cook’s sacking on Saturday with Gilmartin and Dyer working alongside him, as well as academy head of goalkeeping Carl Pentney.

Gilmartin, 34, was at Colchester as a player under McGreal prior to their association at Swindon, which ended before they had taken charge of a match.

Prior to his move to Swindon, the Dubliner had been at Bristol City with CEO Mark Ashton where he was a back-up keeper with some coaching responsibilities.

“His attention to detail is outstanding, he’s a coach for Ireland U21s as well, so he wants to improve himself,” McGreal said of Gilmartin.

“His attention to detail is very, very good, so the boys have been getting good detail in sessions but also on set plays for and against.

“And also with Kieron, with his mindset and his brain from being an Ipswich legend as well. Just trying to blend the three of us together to get the guys going again, especially after what’s gone on and the loss of Paul.

“It was a shock to everyone [Cook’s sacking], so it’s getting ourselves together, battening down the hatches and now let’s go again.”

Regarding former England international Dyer, who McGreal is set to assist in the U23s role he was initially appointed to last Thursday, McGreal says he’s been impressed with what he’s seen of him on the training field.

“Yeah, very good,” he said. “Even when I came in last week and was watching how he works with the U23s. The U23s have been doing particularly well and everyone knows with the development that we want to get the players through from the U23s around the first-team squad.

“We've had past history, Kieron is one of the shining lights of that, maybe the big shining light of the young lads coming up and through.

“He's really passionate about the development of the kids, along with myself. He's very good on the ground and he's heavily involved in the training sessions.

“He's a good coach, brings good details into it. So, I'm sure he'll one day want to be a manager himself and he's got all the attributes to do that.”

He says he and Gilmartin travelled to watch Wigan beat Shrewsbury 2-1 at the DW Stadium last night.

“We used the car as a bit of an office as such and got back about 2.30am last night and were in early this morning to see what Wigan are about,” he said.

“It's just the nature of the job at the minute. Every percentage that we can try and get to get us towards Ipswich winning a game of football, we'll try and do it.”

Photo: Matchday Images

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