A Different Ball Game

Jim has reached the end of another transfer window and the team has been well and truly revamped in the time since it opened. Has it taken us forward significantly? Are we closer to the Premiership than we were? Blue Review, in his first column of the new season, thinks we are, but isnt sure thats necessarily a good thing.

After a close season with a bewildering number of improbable transfer targets being raised on an almost daily basis, it was I suppose, somewhat inevitable that this would be a season with a difference. After last season's near miss, conventional wisdom had it that a bit of team strengthening here and there would create a stronger team - and a realistic tilt at promotion.

Most Town supporters greeted the new season with optimism. Four games in and the atmosphere has change somewhat. Last season Portman Road was a fortress - but we could hardly buy a point away from home for the first half of the season. This season is the polar opposite. Two home games - two inept defeats. The first away game brings a thumping 3-0 win. But the biggest difference has been in personnel - with new signings being mooted or even signed on an almost weekly basis.

The danger for Town (and presumably Jim Magilton) with this polar opposite approach is that the bad displays have been at home in front of lots of witnesses. Last season the rash of shambolic away displays was seen by a minority - and the relentless tide of home wins kept the fickle Portman Road crowd happy. This season the knives could be out unless Magilton's ever-changing teams can turn things around..

Hopefully, it is still early days and the somewhat feeble display against Wolves is an indication of Wolves' excellence, rather than Town's serial ineptitude. But before the game, as I leafed through the programme, I found myself wondering... are Wolves the new Ipswich?

Most of their players seemed to be young - and home-grown. Their major signing, Ebanks-Blake is not only a steal, he is upwardly mobile and clearly destined for better things. The time was when Ipswich Town used to be run this way. I for one, was not entirely surprised when the game turned out the way it did.

Ever since Town's dubious takeover and the availability of a bit of someone else's money, Magilton's transfer strategy and his team building seems to have veered wildly off-track. Last season we had a surprising bulk purchase on non-complimentary midfielders in the transfer window and not the widely-anticipated central defender.

In the close season, a team that scored more goals than almost anybody suddenly has a plethora of would-be strikers lined up to demoralise a pretty effective strike force, not to mention richly promising Jordan Rhodes.

If memory serves, we have been linked with an underperforming Greek, whose lack of goals helped get his team relegated. an obscure Albanian, the eternally injured and frankly not very good Shola Amoebi - and a Slovenian. Not forgetting our apparent obsession with an ex-Preston striker who has gone distinctly iffy and never scored many goals when in his pomp. This after we have already snapped up Kevin Lisbie who himself is surely not really capable of scoring more goals than the existing forwards if Magilton demonstrated any real faith in them.

The defensive signings have been even stranger. McCauley seems to have been Magilton's chosen one - and who knows, had he arrived last season, we might have shoehorned our way into the play offs instead of out of them. But to go for Plug yet again in the hope that he can rekindle some of his old form, rather than look elsewhere for a goalie smacks of laziness. And the less said about Thatcher the better. And still we are not finished. Amoebi's fragile hamstrings won't put us off apparently - and now a German full back who can't get near Fulham's first team is being asked to 'step down a level'. It smacks of madness rather than desperation.

Being a cynic, I have often wondered what real supporters of teams that have been hijacked really think. What can it be like to have supported Chelsea through thick and thin, to see your team bought as a plaything of a bloke who lives his entire life in a bullet-proof bubble - and the team changes on an almost daily basis as the plunder from another country's economy is thrown away on posturing prima donnas?

Ok as long as the signings are good seems to be the answer.

Now however, we have our own dubious owner and the joke seems to be on us. Does Magilton really want all these signings - or is he being pressured into them because our mysterious owner seeks a 'return on his investment'. Do Town fans really want to see weekly signings - or would they rather see a team develop and be able to identify with their team?

Maybe the ever-revolving door is the way of it nowadays. Fulham have apparently got through over 30 players in less than a year. Has it done them any good though? Are they any better now than they were under Chris Coleman a few years ago, who seemed to be able, intelligent - and building a team.

But here's the rub. By quoting examples from the Prem I am as guilty as the powers that be at Town. Everybody is Prem-obsessed. Everybody is looking for short-term solutions. For a club like Town to be telling useless, unproven players who have achieved absolutely nothing as back-up players at third-rate Premiership teams that a move to Town is 'a step down' is suicidal. To endlessly trawl the fag end of third division national teams for bit-part players in foreign leagues is, given recent experiences, a bit like slitting your own wrists for a second time.

To my mind, the secret of success lies a lot closer to home. Hull City went up with a nucleus of players who had played in the third and fourth divisions (including a captain they filched from Cambridge United). Stoke went up with a goal-plundering striker who we ourselves let slip through our fingers. Neither looked like promotion favourites this time last season. Nor, incidentally, did West Brom, whose record at the same time last season was Played 3, lost 2, won 1.

So you could argue with some justification that we are right on target to top this league. But I wonder. Should we be trying to play catch up with Wolves and Bristol City by chasing after Greeks, Albanians, Macedonians or lumps with fragile hamstrings - and toughening up our defence by signing somebody on a downward spiral who has a reputation for thuggishness, but perhaps can't cut the mustard any more?

It's early days - but the signs are not good. Endlessly acquiring more and more players is a recipe for player discontent if the newcomers are no better than what is already here.

All things considered we were not that far away last season. A bit more organisation away from home (and our away from in the last few games was as good as any in the division) and we would have made the play offs. Instead we have a plethora of new signings to make up a 'strong squad'. I hope history is not repeating itself. We all know what happened last time Town went on a signing blitz.