What Ipswich boss Kieran McKenna said after being told Portsmouth result at Bristol City on New Year's Day
Pompey welcome Ipswich Town to Fratton Park on Sunday (3pm)
Kieran McKenna said he’ll be wary of a Pompey backlash when he takes his side to Fratton Park on Sunday.
The Tractor Boys boss admitted it’s never easy facing a side immediately after a heavy defeat like the one the Blues suffered at Bristol City on New Year’s Day.
Indeed, he confessed he’d rather Pompey had won 5-0 at Ashton Gate ahead of his side’s latest trip to PO4 rather than be beaten by such a comprehensive margin.
McKenna conscious of Pompey payback
The defeat, which ended the Blues’ four-match unbeaten run, saw John Mousinho’s side remain 21st in the Championship table, but with their advantage on Norwich, in 22nd, cut to just a single point.
It also re-emphasised the need for reinforcements during the January transfer window, with Pompey down to the bare bones against the Robins after eight players missed the game through injury.
Any strengthening is unlikely to be completed before the visit of the Tractor Boys, with the Blues’ trip to Sheffield United on January a more likely date by which new signings will have arrived.
However, McKenna is more concerned with the payback the hurting hosts could inflict on his side for their visit to the south coast.
Coupled with an equally wounded Fratton faithful, he believes the perfect storm has the potential to lie in wait for the Tractor Boys, who beat fellow Championship strugglers Oxford United at the Kassam Stadium last time out to retain their push for automatic promotion.
McKenna: It doesn’t make job any easier
After learning of Pompey’s 5-0 defeat at Bristol City. McKenna said: ‘I personally never enjoy it when a team has lost heavily before you play against them, I’d rather they had won 5-0. Of course, it can go in two ways.
‘Any time I’ve seen them this year they’ve been a really high energy team, work really hard for the manager and give teams problems, so I’m sure they’ll go and try and deliver that on Sunday.
‘The fact that they’ve lost (at the Robins), I’ll watch the game and take what we can from it, but it certainly never feels like it makes the job any easier, if anything it usually makes it a little bit harder in the next one.’
The Northern Irishman added the intensity at Fratton Park will be far more than what his side faced on their trip to the Kassam Stadium on New Year’s Day.
‘Fratton Park’s a high energy stadium and an aggressive place for away teams to go,’ he said.
‘Today (Thursday), it certainly wasn’t that in our stadium, so we’re going to have be ready to stand up there to the home crowd, to a team who play with a lot of energy, who run a lot, whose intensity is really good and we’re going to have to recover well.
‘I think it will be a physically demanding game. Today was a little bit different, it was a slower game, Oxford sat in and we weren’t quite able to get the energy into the game ourselves.
‘Although they’re in similar positions in the league, I think they’re two different teams and I think it will be a different atmosphere on Sunday.’
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