Town boss Kieran McKenna was pleased to have spent a week training with his full squad for the first time over the last few days.

The Blues made 12 additions over the summer with a handful arriving in the final week before the transfer window closed, before 10 players went away on international duty prior to last week’s 0-0 draw at Brighton.

“Training has been really enjoyable this week,” McKenna said. “The weather has been nice, which always helps, but more importantly, since the end of the transfer window and the international break, it’s the first time we’ve had the whole group together.

“We’ve been able to have more time with the players and have more detailed conversations, not just about technical and tactical thing but also about how we are going to be as a group, laying down some principles about the culture of the group.

“We’ve also been able to spend more time on the training pitch and I can see the understanding of all elements is growing in the group. That’s not completed this week, that’s just the first week we have had.

“The games, of course, are the most important thing and we will give our all this weekend and fight for a performance and fight for points. I do know if we keep working in the right way that we have a great chance of performing stronger and stronger.”

Asked whether last week’s first away point of the season at the Amex Stadium felt like a won, McKenna reflected: “It didn’t feel like a win, it felt like a good draw – in terms of the point gained and how difficult the game was.

“We showed again that we can overcome a lot of challenges. It is a difficult place to go and against a team who have started very well.

“It was also after the international break and we didn’t have all the players to work with, although I know Brighton would have had the same situation. For us, as a group, that’s a bit new. And for the game to not go, for the whole match, exactly how we envisaged it.

“Brighton performed very well in the first half especially – and you are going to be in those situations this season. It is about how you find the collective strength to stay competitive and in games.

“We managed to do that and actually had a 20 or 25-minute spell in the second half when we probably looked like the more likely to score and we could have got a goal in the second half that would have turned it into three points.

“Again, every game at the moment is a building block for us. To go and get our first points away from home and first clean sheet in the Premier League against a team who I think are going to score a lot of goals, and to do it with a team with Dara [O’Shea] coming into the side and a backline that has never played together before, I think it was a good step.”

Asked whether there are signs among the players that they are settling into life in the top flight, McKenna said: “I think maybe across the squad we have had 14 or 15 full Premier League debuts. There are a lot of players experiencing the league for the first time and some who haven’t been in it for a while and are getting back to playing Premier League football more regularly.

“I think there have been plenty of moments from every individual to show that they can impact at this level. It’s a process, the players aren’t going to be perfect every week and no one is, but I think they are all showing positive signs and a mindset.

“We have had lots of individual positives, in terms of players who haven’t played regularly at this level and who have shown they can do. And there is a lot of growth left in the squad – whether Sammie [Szmodics], who is older, has worked his way up from the National League but hasn’t played in the Premier League and who has already shown the impact he can have.

“And also younger players, like Omari [Hutchinson], Liam [Delap], Jacob [Greaves] and Jack Clarke coming on the weekend and performing so well.

“These are young players who haven’t played Premier League football, or at least not regularly, and they are showing that they can impact it already.

“If you are showing that in your early games, you are giving yourself a great base as the season goes on, and hopefully for those players as the years go on.”

Photo: TWTD

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