Town boss Kieran McKenna was pleased with a hard-fought point from their 0-0 draw at West Brom, which sees his side move three points from promotion back to the Premier League with two games to play.

The Baggies, who secured their Championship status following yesterday’s deduction of two points for breaching Financial Fair Play rules, had the better chances in the first half, while the Blues were on top in the second.

“A think a really hard-earned point, to be honest,” McKenna said. “It was always going to be a tough game for many, many different reasons that I could list, and so it proved.

“The first half in particular was difficult. They had probably a little bit more momentum than us and energy and crowd, and it was a difficult day to play good football anyway, irrespective of the time of the season and the game schedule we’re in.

“So it was tough and we had to see off some pressure and it was really important to get to half-time at 0-0 as that’s been something this year that we haven’t always done well enough when we’ve been away from home and against momentum.

“There were some good things there to get that clean sheet in the first half, to really dig in, some really good moments where we did show the resilience. Of course, it needed a good save from Christian [Walton] as well.

“And then I thought we pushed on well in the second half and we moved the ball better and pressed earlier, so we could get the ball back quicker and probably in the last 35 or 40 minutes, certainly the last half-hour, we were the team really pushing to win it.

“A hard-fought point for many reasons, they’re all important over the course of the season and, hopefully, we’ll ensure that this has been a really important one.”

The point moves the Blues back to second, ahead of Millwall on goal difference but with two games remaining the Lions’ one.

Given that and the Baggies’ need to take a point from the game following the deduction and having been one of the division’s form sides, McKenna was asked whether he views it as a good point.

“You don’t know whether it’s a good point,” the Northern Irishman reflected. “I’ll tell you that next Sunday.

“But it was always going to be tough. I’ve said it many times, it’s a brutal division. The margins between the teams, West Brom are a really good team, the gap between them and teams in the play-off positions, or fighting for the play-off positions, for me is really nothing, which is why they can go on a 10-game unbeaten run and keep seven clean sheets. That’s how tight the margins are.

“It was always going to be tough, we know the schedule we’re in. It wasn’t a day which was really conducive to play really good football in terms of the pitch and the heat, which made it really lively and really bobbly, and it was hard to play through the pitch.

“It was tough for many reasons. We wanted to win the game, we set out our stall to win the game but we also know that it wasn’t a situation where it would have been too wise to really go stupidly chasing things and lose the game because, coming away from here on a day like today, a point is something that we can move forward with.”


McKenna says he didn’t watch Millwall’s 1-1 draw at Leicester last night, which added to the Blues’ advantage going into today, but he didn’t instruct his players to take a similar approach.

“You don’t tell them, you just tell them not to put too much energy into it,” he said. “Some boys like watching it and some boys were watching it on the iPad over dinner. I was watching the U21s match on TownTV the big screen and then a bit of Forest and Sunderland.

“I don’t, but other people sometimes like to watch it. Each to their own, but I think whether you watch or not and whatever teams are doing, you’re not investing too much emotional energy to it because the time of the season that it is and the schedule that it is, we need all of that going towards out games.”

Quizzed on his thoughts on the Blues needing three points from the next two to secure their third promotion in four years, McKenna added: “It’s a good position to be in, certainly one that we all would have taken and we know where we’re at.

“On the other hand, we know how hard it is to win a game at this stage of the season and as I’ve said, the schedule is going to be one of the biggest challenges.

“We have to go to another away game now [at Southampton on Tuesday] and another midweek when the team we’re playing against [next Saturday, QPR] are going to be resting all week and preparing the game for us, similar to how it’s been at times over the last couple of weeks.

“We need to get our energy ready to go and win the game on Tuesday night, knowing we have another game on Saturday.

“It’s a good way to go into the last week, but there’s an awful, awful lot to do and it isn’t just going to happen for us, it’s going to take an incredible effort to win either of the next two games.”

McKenna admitted that there were some tired legs at the end of the game, the second of three away from home in six days and the sixth of eight in 27 days since the March international break.

“I thought there were some big shifts,” he added. “You want to play really well every game, you want to come here and really dominate but the boys are giving a lot.

“I thought Ivan [Azon] put in a top shift up front with really not too much service and it was hard to get him into the game well.

“Jack Taylor and Azor [Matusiwa] in terms of the battle, it was difficult but they really got on top of it in the second half.

“You look what Greavesy [Jacob Greaves] has given again, playing every game and then moving to left-back against an attacking right-back. And different examples across the squad.

“I think it was a really good effort from some, especially those who are playing the most minutes and you don’t get a clean sheet away from home against a team with momentum on a day like today without having to work really hard for it.

“You don’t get through the difficult spells in the game, there was maybe one really good save from Christian in the first half after the mistake [by Cedric Kipre] but you don’t get the clean sheet without doing a lot of good work.

“We take those positives and try and do some things better on Tuesday as always, but a really hard-fought point.”

Leif Davis missed out again with the hamstring issue he suffered in the Middlesbrough match last Sunday and McKenna says the left-back wasn’t close to being involved.

“He wasn’t on the bus and if you’re close you tend to be on the bus and he’s back in Suffolk,” he said. “Still a doubt [for Tuesday] but not impossible, so we’ll assess it over the weekend.”

McKenna says Sunday will be a day of rest before the trip to Southampton on Monday: “Day off tomorrow and unpack and pack the suitcase!”

Photo: TWTD