Ipswich Town 2-2 Aston Villa: Kieran McKenna's verdict

The Blues led, trailed, equalised and then pressed hard for a winner against Champions League opposition, Liam Delap scoring a fine brace to make it four games unbeaten in the Premier League.

"I thought it was a really good game," said McKenna. "That's important to us. Since I arrived here one of the big things on the check list was making Portman Road a fantastic place to come and watch football, to give the supporters an entertaining game and a team to be proud of. They've certainly done that today.

"Of course we want to get as many points as we can, but to compete as we did against a team of the calibre that Aston Villa are, a team with great familiarity working under a very good manager, is a big, big positive. 

"It's another point, another game unbeaten and we move on."

Liam Delap celebrates after getting Ipswich Town back to 2-2 against Aston Villa. (Image: PA)

Following Delap's 72nd minute leveller, Town, who forced 10 corners in this game, pushed hard for a winner in the latter stages. 

"Look, we always back ourselves at Portman Road that that's going to be the case," said McKenna. 

"If it goes to the later stages we back our fitness and we know that the crowd will give us the extra yard and extra edge.

"We had a lot of set plays, some moments around the box, but credit to them they stood up and defended well. We weren't quite able to get it over the line."

Reflecting further on the game, he said: "The goals (against), of course, were a set-back because we'd put ourselves in a  good position in the game.

"We just needed to adjust some things and step on a bit more from our defensive shape. Aston Villa had some spells of possession that were longer than we wanted as the home team. We needed to take more aggressive decisions out of possession of when to jump and apply pressure - and we did that. That gave us more momentum and more territory in the game.

"I still think in the first half we created more clearer chances than in the second half, but in the second half we managed to control them earlier and pin them into their half more. That meant we were able to get a good level of domination in the game.

"Overall there were positives across both halves."

Town now sit 14th in the Premier League table with four points from their opening six games - half of those matches having come against teams currently competing in the Champions League.

"We feel like we've been really competitive in every game," said McKenna. 

"Each game is different. It's not like inch-by-inch, another 2% and we get a win because next Saturday's game might be completely different.

"We need to start from scratch every week, but there have been good things from every game.

"We're going to have to fight for points in all 38 games. The next chance to do that is at West Ham. It doesn't get any easier, but we'll go with the same characteristics as today."