Town chairman and CEO Mark Ashton says a new mindset is being instilled at the academy aimed at ensuring players know how to win matches.

The Blues’ academy was awarded category one status on a provisional basis in the summer with it expected to be confirmed permanently in due course.

Town’s U21s, under John McGreal and Chris Casement, have flourished since the switch and are top of Premier League 2, ahead of the likes of Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea.

The U18s have fared less well and sit bottom of their division, although progressed through the third round of the FA Youth Cup by winning 3-1 away at Sheffield United just over a week ago and face a trip to Bromley in round four.

Speaking at Tuesday’s PLC AGM, Ashton was asked when fans might see players from the academy progressing into the first team with two brief sub appearances from Cameron Humphreys the only Championship involvement from Playford Road alumni this season.

“We have to recruit at both ends,” Ashton said. “We have to recruit into the U9s, U10s, U11s, U12s because that’s the long-term development process, that’s where your [Luke] Woolfendens etc will come through.

“And we have to fast-track, so part of our recruitment process now will be recruiting 18, 19, 21-year-olds from other clubs and bringing them in as a development squad so that they start closer to the first team.

“From an economic and a development perspective, and from a fanbase perspective there’s nothing better than having one of your own or a couple of your own in the team.

“The answer is as soon as possible and the good thing is when you’ve got a [Kieran] McKenna-type manager, he’s a natural developer. He has an absolute passion for the academy, coaches coaching in the academy and he wants to progress.

“A lot of our boys who are at the top end of the academy now train with Kieran most days, so he drags them closer.

“I can’t tell you exactly when but as soon as possible. You’ll have seen that the U21s are doing well and there’s been a real mindset shift in the academy.

“Part of that for me is going to be re-educating our academy players but also re-educating parents because I think we’ve had a challenge with our academy system for a number of years where we develop very technically nice players who don’t know how to win games of football.

“From nine years of age here, you now need to be taught how to win. We want nice, technical, gifted, physical players, but they’ve got to know how to win, and that’s a fundamental difference.

“I think [director of football operations] Dmitri [Halajko] and [academy manager] Ben [Chenery] come with that real mentality leading the academy, so when the players get to Kieran, they’re ready.

“What I want is when a player goes up to train with Kieran, he doesn’t go back to the academy, he stays. Kieran says, ‘yes please!’ and keeps him with him.

“And that’s a mindset shift because the way we then deal with the younger players is probably going to be a little bit tougher and a little bit more old school.

“I’ve said before, I’m a dinosaur. When I left school and joined West Bromwich Albion at 16, my first full-time coach was a gentleman called Nobby Stiles, hence why I’m a little bit the way I am!

“But Nobby taught us football values, taught us how to win games of football and I think we have to get that blend of technical and tactical ability into the boys, but also we’ve got to win games here.

“I think we’ve put a lot of effort into the Ipswich Town Foundation over the last four years, and that’s really flying now.

“We’ve worked really hard behind the scenes reorganising the academy and now you’re going to hear a lot of noise about the academy because we intend to push it forward at pace to get the players through.”

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