Ipswich Town are set to play their first pre-season friendly this afternoon as they prepare for the upcoming Premier League campaign. Alex Jones shares everything you need to know about the five games...
Town will face Shakhtar Donetsk in their first pre-season friendly (Image: PA)
The fixtures
Ipswich, who returned for pre-season on Monday, July 1st, play their first fixture this afternoon. They’ve been out at a training camp in the Carinthia region of Austria this week and will take on Shakhtar Donetsk in two hour-long games at the Sportzentrum Landskron in Villach this afternoon (1pm BST).
The Ukrainian side lifted the league title last season, having won it 15 times since 1991. It means that they’ll enter the Champions League at the league stage next season, having finished third Group H behind FC Barcelona and FC Porto in 2023/24 before being knocked out of the Europa League by Marseille.
Shakhtar Donetsk have already played two friendlies against Turkish opposition this summer, thrashing Rizespor 5-0 and beating Besiktas 1-0. Manager Marino Pusic was assistant manager to Arne Slot at AZ Alkmaar and Feyenoord, with the Dutchman now in charge of Liverpool – Town’s first opponents in the Premier League.
The Blues will host Fortuna Dusseldorf and OGC Nice at Portman Road (Image: PA)
They’ll return home next week to train at Playford Road ahead of their next friendly against old friends Fortuna Dusseldorf, which will take place at Portman Road on Saturday, July 27th (3pm BST). Fans will be able to watch the team play at IP1 for the first time since securing promotion to the Premier League against Huddersfield Town. The match will include extra time and a penalty shoot-out regardless of the score after 90 minutes.
Town head abroad once again at the end of July for a short camp in Germany, where they’ll play two games against Bundesliga opposition. The first will be against Borussia Monchengladbach at ATS Sportpark in Heimstetten on the outskirts of Munich on Friday, August 2nd (1:30pm BST).
The following day (Saturday, August 3rd), they’ll cross the border into Austria as they travel to the town of Kufstein to play Hoffenheim at Kufstein Arena (12:30pm BST) before travelling back for training the following week.
The final pre-season fixture comes seven days later on Saturday, August 10th (12:30pm BST) as Ipswich take to the Portman Road pitch for the last time ahead of their Premier League opener, taking on Ligue 1 outfit OGC Nice.
All five fixtures will be streamed on Town TV (Image: PA)
How to watch
All five pre-season fixtures will be streamed live on Town TV, with two different options available.
A single match pass will cost £4.99, while a Town TV summer package will be £15 and provide access to all the games. On top of this, monthly subscribers will have access to audio commentary without having to pay extra.
Coverage of today’s game against Shakhtar Donetsk will begin 10 minutes before kick off (12:50pm), with Glenn Wheeler and Ian Westlake on commentary.
The East Anglian Times and Ipswich Star will also be providing updates and reports from every match.
Kieran McKenna is expected to hand out some debuts to his new signings this afternoon (Image: PA)
Things to look out for
Of course, everyone will be looking out for the new signings. Omari Hutchinson is set to play his first minutes since making a permanent move to Suffolk, while Ben Johnson, Jacob Greaves and Liam Delap are expected to make their Ipswich debuts against Shakhtar this afternoon.
Arijanet Muric, who joined the training camp in Austria midway through the week after completing his switch from Burnley, could also be handed his first minutes in a Town shirt.
As pre-season progresses, there’ll be more and more excitement around each game as further signings are announced. While nothing seems imminent at this point, the Blues are likely to make a few more additions before the Premier League campaign kicks off next month.
We’ll get a proper look at the new shirts for the first time, too. The goalkeeper kits are yet to go on sale, but we got a glimpse of the pink and yellow tops when Muric was announced. Supporters will get to see the new home and away strips in the flesh, and there’ll probably be quite a few of them in the stands too.
For those attending the games against Fortuna Dusseldorf and Nice, there'll certainly be some differences at Portman Road. Work will still be ongoing ahead of August 17th, but there may be one or two changes that you'll notice.
It’ll be interesting to see how Ipswich set up tactically, because Kieran McKenna will surely look to make one or two tweaks heading into next season. Many of the players in the squad are yet to play a single minute of Premier League football, so he’ll be working them hard to get them to the right level.
It remains to be seen where Omari Hutchinson will play in Town's attacking line (Image: PA)
The 4-2-3-1 formation is surely here to stay, but how flexible will it be? Fans will remember the early days under McKenna where Town switched into a back five when they needed a more defensive shape. We didn’t see it too much in the Championship, but maybe it’ll be used more in the Premier League?
There’s also a question mark over positions. Hutchinson, for example, played most of his minutes on the right last season, but he also impressed through the middle and on the left. Where will McKenna look to play him in pre-season?
Will Delap play up top or on the right? Will Axel Tuanzebe compete with Johnson at right-back? Will we get an idea of which centre-backs will play against Liverpool based on the partnerships used in pre-season?
There are a lot of question marks hanging over the tactics, and we’ll certainly get some answers in the next few weeks.
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