Ipswich Town boss Kieran McKenna has regularly stressed that he isn't looking at the league table, despite the fact that his side are flying high in the Championship.

However, the Northern Irishman believes that the promotion race might start to take shape around the New Year, which is when the Blues will hit the halfway point in the campaign.

Once Town have hosted leaders Leicester City on Boxing Day they'll have played the other 23 teams at least once, while the same can be said for the rest of the division.

McKenna believes this will give a basic indication of who's battling in what part of the table, although he's aware that a lot can change between January and May.

“Realistically, come the halfway point in the season, it’s natural to know," he explained.

“I know where we were at the halfway point last season, so I think that’s a natural point to take stock.

“Having said that, there’s lots of teams in the history of the Championship who go on to have a storming second half of the season. There’s teams who’ve been at the top of the Championship who’ve had a very different second half of the season.

“Every manager is different, and teams probably look at it in a different way, but my belief and my experience is that things can change very, very quickly. It’s not too wise to look much beyond your next performance.

“If you manage to do that for 46 games, which is an awful lot harder than it probably sounds because it’s a lot of concentration, to concentrate and try to find a performance in each one, then you’ll be a pretty good team.”

At the halfway point in League One last season, Ipswich sat in second place with 48 points. Plymouth Argyle boasted a narrow lead at the top of the table while Sheffield Wednesday trailed them in third.

The three teams finished in the exact same order, with all of them nearly mirroring their points total from the first half of the campaign, proving that the league table can certainly take shape after 23 games.

The Blues - who sit second in the table with 39 points from 16 games - return to action next Saturday at seventh-place West Brom.