PORTMAN ROAD — The build-up to this moment was 87 minutes in the making, a countdown extended almost to its maximum. No late drama, no mania – simply a team passing for time as their congregation sang oles and waited impatiently to exalt. Ipswich Town are Premier League. Again.
At each end of Portman Road, an eternal leader of Ipswich Town looks down. Bobby Robson and Alf Ramsey: two stands, two sirs, two managers who forged heroship in Suffolk, two inspirational leaders against whom everyone else is destined to be compared unflatteringly here. On sunny days like this, the pillars of history literally cast shadows.
Kieran McKenna knows that only too well. On a wall outside his office in Portman Road, a framed photograph of Sir Bobby offers a friendly glance every time he goes to work. You can allow majestic history to hang around your neck as a millstone or you can recycle it into fuel. There was never any doubt which option McKenna would take.
McKenna now stands with Robson and Ramsey on the podium. He took over a club drifting nowhere pleasant. He has overseen three promotions in four seasons, two of them to the Premier League. He was the fastest manager in Ipswich’s history to 100 wins. He stayed when many, maybe even most, made peace with a probable departure.
Ipswich town centre was transformed for destiny day. McKenna’s greatest achievement may be moving the football club back into the bosom of its public. The town hall had been lit up in blue this week. Shops and local businesses put up balloons, posters and bunting. If the size of the team drives the outcome, McKenna had 150,000 on his side.
An early kick-off preempted celebration. Roads closed early. Groups of mates mused whether it was too early for a settler with the taste of breakfast still on the lips. Thousands lined the streets on the entrance to Portman Road for the arrival of the team coach, provoking a vast fog of blue smoke.
The wall of sound before the game was something else. As the players walked onto the pitch, one or two looked up and around, caught off guard by an atmosphere that demanded their performance meet their public halfway. Portman Road’s West Stand is brilliant at retaining noise that circles and swirls. Not even the waving of 15,000 white flags – to accompany the blue – could summon a decent jinx.
Queens Park Rangers were all that stood in the tractor’s path, here on the back of three straight defeats and a repeat of their lower-midtable obscurity. Some clubs are destined to rise, fall and rise again. QPR have finished between ninth and 20th in this league for the last 11 years. They were malleable and gloriously acquiescent, to the extent that some away fans nipped out for a pint after nine minutes.
By then Millwall and Middlesbrough were already preparing for the playoffs. Ipswich were ruthless and relentless, right on queue. They scored after three minutes and that wasn’t even their first clear chance. Attacking players dipped into space and dovetailed, bamboozling a defence playing at half speed in sliders. Jeopardy was forcibly evaporated in seconds; it’s overrated anyway.
This bend of the Ipswich Town rollercoaster has hardly been easy. The last time they were a Championship team it was as an upstart, bruising noses and upturning expectations having arrived from League One. This season only the pressure felt relevant. McKenna’s team were the preseason title favourites.
Ipswich didn’t always cope well. They didn’t win until their fifth match of the season. Their two most expensive summer signings – more than £30m between them – have started 32 combined league matches. Ipswich have spent less time in the lead than anyone else in the top six and won only nine of their 23 away games. They took 12 fewer points than two years ago.
But who cares now? They rediscovered their verve in 2026, an automatic promotion race muscle memory, and lost one of their final 15 league games. If the two most expensive signings haven’t quite soared, there are other heroes: captain Dara O’Shea, monumental at the back; Azor Matusiwa, who breaks up play for fun in midfield; Jack Clarke, super-sub extraordinaire.
There is a belief inside Ipswich Town that they belong in the Premier League, given the work, the ambition and the standards of excellence set. O’Shea explicitly said as much this week. There will be a determination to improve upon their previous experience, 22 points and limp relegation after early promise.
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That presents promotion not as the pinnacle, as it may have felt two years ago, but merely a further step along the journey to a different destination than before. It will be the message of McKenna to those who stay and those who join this summer.
Still, days like these demand that you take a step back to appreciate the view in wider focus. In September 2021, less than half a decade ago, those inside Portman Road watched a team managed by Paul Cook lose 5-2 at home. Ipswich were winless and in the bottom three of the third tier.
The six opponents that Ipswich couldn’t beat at the beginning of that season: Morecambe, Burton, Cheltenham, MK Dons, AFC Wimbledon, Bolton Wanderers. Thanks to McKenna and those who allowed him to flourish, those are now two different worlds.
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