Town boss Kieran McKenna said he was really proud of his players and of the club after the 0-0 FA Cup fourth-round draw with Championship leaders Burnley at Portman Road.

The Blues were the better side in the first half and after the Clarets had been on top for much of the second, finished the game the stronger of the two teams.

“I’m proud of the players, proud of the club,” McKenna said. “I thought it was a fantastic crowd, a good atmosphere, really intense performance by the team. The whole squad contributed and played a part.

“It was a difficult game, it was a good game from a coaching point of view, it was a challenge, both teams were pressing really high, both teams were really aggressive, both teams were looking to play, but neither gave too many chances to the other team to build any sort of rhythm.

“Obviously not a great game in terms of lots of clear-cut chances either way, but a game in which I think we should be proud of the player and the club.

“I thought there were a lot of things that we will take from it, a lot of things that we’ll learn from it and I think we’ll be stronger from the experience of the game and stronger from going up to Turf Moor and playing them at their place. It will be an experience and a challenge that we’ll learn from.”

Having made eight changes to the XI which beat Morecambe 4-0 on Tuesday, McKenna was pleased with his side’s strength in depth.

“I think that was a pleasing aspect of the day,” he said. “If you look at how the players did that came into the team, I think they can be proud of themselves, the likes of Greg Leigh coming in not having played very much in the last couple of months since he came back from injury.

“To come into the team and to be fit enough first and foremost to play 90 minutes actually surprised me at the intensity we require from him and he had a big role in terms of pressing high an jumping out to the opposition right-back.

“We thought it would be 45-60 minutes but to be able to do 90 minutes at that level is a really good reflection on the work going on behind the scenes by the players and the staff and we’re going to need that attitude form every man in the squad until the end of the season.”

The Blues boss was also impressed by Kayden Jackson’s display on the right flank: “Very good. I’ve never got any doubts about what he gives. Football’s a game of opinions. For me, he always steps up for the team when we need him, especially in big games against difficult opponents.

“He was playing against a Premier League left-back [Charlie Taylor], who has played in the Premier League for so many years and has been excellent this year and he gave him a really tough game in terms of his attacking threat and he was a massive help to us defending their threat.

“For me, I know what he brings to the team in all aspects and it was another really strong performance from him against a really tough opponent.”

McKenna says his team can take belief from the display: “I think we should take confidence from it. It’s probably the highest level of opponent quite a few of the players have played against, the best team to come to Portman Road in quite a few years as well.

“We should take confidence from it from the direction that we’re going in from seeing our style of play, our principles going up against that level of opponent and staying strong both on and off the ball is something that we can take confidence from.

“I don’t think it changes anything drastic in terms of the challenges that we face this season, whether we had 1-0 or lost 1-0 but I think in terms of our general travel as a club and as a team and our development of the team, I think going against such a strong team and competing well is something we should take confidence from and strength for the future.”"

Regarding the replay at Turf Moor in just over a week’s time, he reflected: “We’re looking forward to it, to be honest. Of course, you can say we play Sheffield Wednesday that week and it’s a long trip, but at the end of the day these games only make you stronger.

“We’ll be stronger for the experience, we’ll be better for the experience, we have a big squad, we’re fresh, we’re fit and we want these challenges and we want these games in the season and we want these challenges and we want these games in our careers.

“We’ll look forward to it. Of course, we’d rather have won and we had our moments to do that, but Burnley did as well and we look forward to going to Turf Moor, it’s going to be a really tough game but another where we’ll be stronger coming out the other end of it if we approach it as we did today.”

Town will go into Monday’s fifth round draw, which takes place live on The One Show at 7pm, for the first time since 2007."

“That’s nice,” McKenna said. “I didn’t think about that after the game and somebody just said it. We said we wanted to be in the hat, of course it will only be a ‘maybe’ draw but that’s better that not being there. We’ll look forward to that on Monday.”

Asked whether he wants his old club Manchester United in the next round or the round after, he laughed: “We have to again be humble as we were today about the challenge that’s going to be at Turf Moor. We kept a clean sheet against them today, one of the only teams who have done that all season.

“We did it being really brave and aggressive with our defending and brave with the ball but that’s going to be harder again at Turf Moor and we know they will really want to go through to the next round as well.

“We can’t look past that game, my 100 per cent focus goes to Cambridge now, I won’t be thinking about this game at all next week, it will be 100 per cent focus on Cambridge and then after that we’ll get eyes on Burnley and we’ll dream about what we could possibly do to get to the next round.”

Regarding Leif Davis and Wes Burns, who were absent from the 20-man squad, he said: “Both just have little minor issues that we wanted to protect, so we’ll see how they go next week. Nothing major with either, we’ll see how they are next week for training but it wasn’t right to take any risks with those two today.”

Photo: TWTD

churchmans81 added 18:45 - Jan 28 “We've got super Kieran McKenna He knows exactly what we need Woolfie at the back, Ladapo in attack Town are going to win the FA Cup” 😁💙🤍⚽️🏆
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BlueRuin69 added 18:46 - Jan 28 We are lucky to have McKenna. Coyb
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Suffolkboy added 18:56 - Jan 28 Bang on , KM , in every respect ! COYB
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ScottCandage added 19:09 - Jan 28 When you think you can't be prouder of this team, they put forth a fantastic match against a team that, all things being equal, are much better than we are. ONWARD AND UPWARD!!!!!!
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warfarinman69 added 22:42 - Jan 28 The one thing I can't agree with McKenna is he says it wasn't a great game. I haven't enjoyed a match at PR so much in ages. Two good teams, no parking the bus, little time wasting and some proper football from both sides. Kompany was class in his after match comments. McKenna is simply class in everything he does. This club will be in the Premiership in 3-4 years, whatever happens this year

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BurleysGloryDays added 23:44 - Jan 28 legend
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19781981twtd added 15:05 - Jan 29 The manager speaks like someone of far greater age very wise and balanced the game has changed from "grunt,grown muscle" to science and KMcK is the new bread of manager we are lucky.
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