Who To Pick From Ipswich

Drafting from Ipswich

Ipswich are nineteenth on 76 with thirty-one names, no elite player anywhere, and a squad that leans hard to one side. Daizen Maeda at 81 is the best of them by two, and the department around him, left wing at 77 across three bodies, is the strongest thing at the club. Add Leif Davis on 79 at left-back and the whole left flank is stocked, functional and reasonably deep by the standards of this end of the table.

Now turn the picture round. Right-back is 70, and it comes from one man. In a squad of thirty-one, Ipswich have precisely one right-back, and that group sits seven points below the club's best, the left wing. That is not a side you can build symmetrically. Either you accept a lopsided team that attacks down one touchline, or you shop for a right-back before you do anything else here. In between sit Saša Lukić on 78 and a pair on 76 in Marcelino Núñez and Abdul Fatawu, and the spread of seven mostly tells you how long the tail runs. Ten of the thirty-one are English, the biggest bloc by a distance, with three Irishmen next.

The legend to take is Matt Holland at 90, and the reason is arithmetic rather than sentiment. Central midfield is where Ipswich are thinnest at the top: Núñez, their best centre midfielder, is on 76, and Lukić at 78 is a holder rather than a passer. Holland lands fourteen above Núñez and turns the weakest part of the spine into the one department that can dictate a game. Pair him with the left flank you already have and there is a functioning half of a team here.