Town continue their pre-season friendly programme when they host fellow Championship side Charlton Athletic at Colchester United’s JobServe Community Stadium this evening (KO 7.30pm).

The Blues have no Portman Road friendlies this summer with the annual scrape and seed of the pitch having taken place either side of the recent Ed Sheeran concerts, not allowing time for a pre-season match.

The Blues go into tonight’s fixture having lost 1-0 in a behind-close-doors game with Peterborough before a 4-1 away win against Blau Weiß Linz in Austria at the end of the week-long training camp.

Last Tuesday afternoon, they fell to 1-0 and 2-0 defeats to Premier League West Ham in two 60-minute matches at their training ground.

On Friday, Town impressed as they beat Scottish Premiership side Aberdeen, whose season proper starts on Monday, at Pittodrie.

Manager Kieran McKenna said after that game that those who were on the bench and came on after 65 minutes in Scotland are likely to be the starters this evening.

That would see a line-up of Christian Walton in goal with Luke Woolfenden and Conor Townsend the full-backs, and Cedric Kipre and Elkan Baggott the centre-backs.

Harry Clarke would be in central midfield alongside Cameron Humphreys with Chiedozie Ogbene on the right, Conor Chaplin in the middle and Nathan Broadhead on the left, and Ali Al-Hamadi the striker. Again, wholesale changes are likely to be made around the hour mark.

Another Town XI is playing Colchester United in a behind-closed-doors friendly this afternoon, so that may indicate the Blues are fielding two different first-team sides today with the U21s at Bury Town for a friendly this evening.

McKenna said on Friday that it was still to be decided whether Omari Hutchinson would be involved against the Addicks, but that “I would have thought next week we’ll get him in and around it”.

Hutchinson, a target of Premier League Brentford, returned to training last week having helped the England U21s to win the Euros in Slovakia last month.

The former Chelsea man has been working alongside new signing Ashley Young at Playford Road. Young similarly may not yet be considered ready for involvement this evening.

Wes Burns and Aro Muric have not been involved in pre-season so far as they continue their recoveries from their ACL and shoulder injuries, while keeper Cieran Slicker is again unlikely to feature as he looks for a loan club.

Charlton are back in the Championship having won promotion from League One last season via the play-offs, beating Leyton Orient 1-0 in the final.

Managed by former Luton, Stoke and Southampton boss Nathan Jones, the South Londoners won 3-2 away at Dartford in their opening friendly before a 2-0 victory against Croatian top division side HNK Gorica in Slovenia.

A 3-0 away win at Wealdstone followed, before a 1-1 draw against League Two Cambridge United on Saturday at the Abbey Stadium.

Former Blues striker Gassan Ahadme is a member of the Charlton squad having joined them from Town in July last year. The 24-year-old had a disappointing spell with the Blues, scoring once in one start and seven sub appearances in two injury hit years at the club.

While it’s unusual to play a team from the same division in pre-season, the Blues faced Preston ahead of their 2023/24 campaign at Deepdale, running out 2-1 winners.

Town last faced the Addicks in League One at Portman Road in April 2023 when the promotion-bound Blues romped to a 6-0 victory, Conor Chaplin hitting a hat-trick, Freddie Ladapo, who joined Charlton on loan in the following campaign, a brace and Leif Davis one.

Earlier in the 2022/23 season, the teams had drawn 4-4 at the Valley in an extraordinary game in which the Blues had a secured a 4-2 lead in injury time before conceding two late, late goals.

George Edmundson and Tyreece John-Jules put the Blues 2-0 in front but the Addicks hit back through Jes Rak-Sakyi and and Albie Morgan.

However, in injury time, Town restored their two-goal advantage through Ladapo and Sam Morsy, but Terell Thomas and George Dobson netted in the sixth and ninth minutes of the additional time to claim a remarkable point for the home side.

The teams last met in pre-season at the Valley ahead of the 2017/18 season with the then-League One Addicks hammering Mick McCarthy’s Championship Blues 6-1 a week before the start of the campaign proper.

Patrick Bauer, Tariqe Fosu and Josh Magennis (2) put the home side 4-0 up at half-time before two Ricky Holmes strikes sandwiched Andre Dozzell’s solitary goal for Town in the second half.

Typically for pre-season, the Blues beat Birmingham City 1-0 at home the following week in their league opener and then won the next four in all competitions.

Photo: IMAGO/Pro Sports Images via Reuters Connect

Cookieboy added 10:53 - Jul 29 Can you explain why Slicker is looking for a loan club, surely clubs should be looking at him for a potentially loan deal. He should be playing and clubs watching. !!!!
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SheptonMalletBlue added 10:54 - Jul 29 That 4-4 still hurts!!
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Bluearmy_81 added 10:58 - Jul 29 Where is the striker?! Al Ham was just about at his level at Stoke, he is not a top championship striker of a top 2 club. Will be another error by McKenna, (like sticking with Muric too long) if we don’t get someone in soon…
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bluesissy added 11:18 - Jul 29 Yes where is the striker?.. tik tok tik tok
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Linkboy13 added 11:38 - Jul 29 McKenna is not responsible for the scouting and buying of players . He might give his approval but that's about it.
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Juggsy added 12:47 - Jul 29 Paper thin midfield too …
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Len_Brennan added 12:58 - Jul 29 It's an important game for Humphreys, who needs to show that he is ready to be a match day squad level midfielder, for a promotion chasing Championship side.
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SickParrot added 13:00 - Jul 29 Season starts in 10 days and we only have three midfield players and two injury prone strikers. Not ideal!
1

Monkey_Blue added 13:41 - Jul 29 If we haven’t signed top class midfielder and a red hot striker before the Birmingham game… the world will still spin on its axis. The transfer window will still be open and I’d rather us go into the season with players KM wants than supplement the squad with players we can sign quickly. I’m sure there are players worth millions we could sign today but if they aren’t what the manager wants it’s a waste of money and counterproductive to efforts to get promoted. I’m sure lots of activity is going on behind the scenes and I’d be very disappointed if we sign anyone just to satisfy fans or make up the numbers.

7

Paulc added 13:51 - Jul 29 What an entitled bunch of *&%$s some have bencome on here. Look at the current squad compared to that which got promoted from the Championship last time and it's miles ahead. I doubt there's a championship fanbase that wouldn't swap their squad for ours in a heartbeat. I don't diagree that we need to add some depth in the midfield and striker roles but it's hardly a reason to start moaning about the manager is it?

13

oioihardy added 15:04 - Jul 29 Yes we need a st . We need midfeild players . Hackney apparently has a medical booked for Friday. We are working on the midfeild first as hirst and ali are both fit .... im sure once the cms are sorted we will move to a st . But at the moment we have 2 fit sts one is class in hirst . Midfeild is desperately needing attention which we are working on as we comment on this article. Have patients

2

del45 added 15:31 - Jul 29 Middlesbrough signed midfielder player today on 5yr contract Oioihardy how do you know this.?
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BlueWax added 15:37 - Jul 29 Del45, oil oil hardy is doing the medical
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blues1 added 16:18 - Jul 29 Monkey Blue. Spot on. We have a perfectly good squad already. Just need 2 more to get us where we ideally need to be. Strange how fans moan when we bring in a "panic buy", as they say, yet want us to just rush into signing players now. We need 1 midfielder. That will give us 4 cms, only 1 down on last season. Having 5 would make it very hard to keep everyone happy in the championship. Then we need a striker. Well, surprise surprise, so does almost every other club. It's the hardest position to fill. Sure we are looking hard. But no point getting one in that doesnt fit the bill. So better to take a bit of time, and get the right one hopefully. Any of you who are moaning on every single story, regardless of the subject, if you think you could do better, maybe u should offer ur services to the club.

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Bluearmy_81 added 16:53 - Jul 29 PaulC, I called out Evans when ‘fans’ on here were giving him an eternal free pass years ago and did my bit to get him out, I set up Evans out of ITFC on Facebook. Ipswich fans are the least entitled fans there are!! The degree of apathy and sycophancy in those dark years was mind blowing. I’ve got more right than wrong over these years so name call all you like, not in the slightest arsed about what you think

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algarvefan added 17:30 - Jul 29 Oh dear the moan boys are back already, be patient, sometimes these deals take time, our squad is good and I'm sure a couple others will be added soon.
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Paulc added 17:38 - Jul 29 Blues81 well it looks like your are indeed arsed otherwise why reply? Making any sort of comparison to this current transfer activity and the Marcus Evans era is laughable. The very fact that you experienced that era you’d think would make you appreciate what we now have.
1

armchaircritic59 added 17:48 - Jul 29 As a famous poster from World War II said, " Keep calm and carry on ".
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ArmaghBlue added 17:50 - Jul 29 I presume it will be a second string team tonight?
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Linkboy13 added 18:01 - Jul 29 We won't want to give too much away to future opponents in the championship so expect plenty of changes during the game.
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armchaircritic59 added 18:46 - Jul 29 Blues1, the last sentence in your above post, sums it all up. Only I hope they don't take the offer up, I fear we'd be facing non league football within 3 seasons.
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blueboy1981 added 19:04 - Jul 29 …,,, amazing that already, and the season hasn’t started yet, that the ‘excuses’ for everything the Club does are at the forefront from the same condoning posters, as always. The Squad is painfully short of around three necessary players - that will be so obvious when the season commences and the treatment room beckons a few visits - as it WILL !!
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Bluearmy_81 added 19:10 - Jul 29 Doesn’t mean we should rest on our laurels for one minute. Yes things are infinitely better now than 4-5 years ago but that’s because we demanded better. Why stop doing that? No other fans would have put up with Evans for so long, that’s why I said Town fans are the least entitled ever. Why stop demanding the very best for the club? Its like some town fans can’t wait to sit back into apathy, rest in their laurels and watch the slide… Makes no sense, need to be relentless and merciless

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SuffPunch added 19:15 - Jul 29 Is it on TV or a stream anywhere?
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