With newly-promoted Ipswich Town second in the Championship table, Stuart Watson sat down with chief executive Mark Ashton to discuss a range of topics. In part one of this interview, the upcoming January transfer window was discussed.
When Ipswich Town was taken over by an American pension fund back in 2021, one supporter reached out to the new owners on social media to ask if they had the financial resources to take a stagnant club forwards.
Mark Steed, the chief investment officer for the Arizona Public Safety Personnel Retirement System, didn't mince his words in response. "Our fund is $13 billion and we’re holding $700m in cash. So, yeah?"
That financial muscle, allied with young manager Kieran McKenna's fast growing reputation for improving players, meant the Blues were able to persuade several players to drop down to the third-tier and join an ambitious project.
Three players - Leif Davis, Harry Clarke, Nathan Broadhead - were signed for seven-figure fees as a League One club. So when promotion was secured with juggernaut-like momentum, many, understandably, pondered quite how big the summer spend would be.
Would the club-record transfer fee of £4.5m - paid out for both Hermann Hreidarsson and Matteo Sereni as a Premier League club back in the early 00s - be broken? It was looking that way when the Blues were linked to Everton front man Ellis Simms. Ipswich weren't drawn into that bidding war though, the 22-year-old ultimately going to Coventry in a deal reported to be worth up to £8m.
Instead, the Blues signed two players for a combined £3m - Jack Taylor and George Hirst - rewarded some key men (including the manager) with new contracts and supplemented what they'd got with three young Premier League loanees in Omari Hutchinson, Brandon Williams and Dane Scarlett.
"You’ve got to remember, we’re governed by profit and sustainability rules," said chief executive Mark Ashton, reflecting on a transfer window that left many underwhelmed but ultimately has paid dividends given the Blues, full of chemistry and camaraderie, currently find themselves second in the Championship table after 16 games.
"We’ll be brave and we’ll be bold, but we won’t be reckless. There’s a big difference. What I’m not going to do it put this club in a position where we face potential points deductions. Having sat on the league board I know the process, I've seen it happen and I just won’t put us in that position.
“We know the headroom that we’ve got. I'm always backed by the owners. Financially, Kieran is always backed. But Kieran will only bring in the right type of players. He won’t just bring in a player for the numbers that’s just not in his make-up. He's selective and that is something I’m really proud of.
"The window always moves, it's like a spider’s web that almost changes on an hourly basis. We were calm and we stepped through it. We knew the key positions that we wanted to recruit into and we knew the key positions we wanted to retain to make sure the squad was solid.
“Last January, remember, the four signings we made (Clarke, Hirst, Broadhead and Massimo Luongo) were Championship players. We were recruiting for the Championship in League One. Then the market we were recruiting from changed because there are Championship clubs who now see us as potential competition, so they won’t want to do business with you.
“I think we had an outstanding pre-season. (Director of performance) Andy Rolls and his team put together a really detailed programme. We played Preston in a friendly (winning 2-1 away) and I think that game probably opened one or two peoples’ eyes that actually ‘oh, they’re not bad’. I think you saw, by the time we got to Sunderland, we were ready.
“There were other players we could have signed at the end of the window, we had the financial firepower to do it, but Kieran was really clear; ‘No, I’m good with what we’ve got, we've got unity and balance, the squad is good’.
“That was fine with me. I’ve said it before, I don’t like doing last minute.com. I think you make bad decisions when you’re rushing at the end of a window. Sometimes you have to, but I prefer to step through things early if I can."
It's now only 47 days until the transfer window opens again.
Town supporters often look back on January 2015 and rue the fact that previous owner Marcus Evans didn't strengthen from a position of strength when the team was flying high in the Championship, Mick McCarthy's men ultimately slipping to sixth and losing in the play-off semi-finals to bitter rivals Norwich.
Will that be different this time around?
“When you plan a summer window you’ve also got January and the following summer in mind because the Financial Fair Play rules run across all those windows," said Ashton.
“We knew the financial position we were in, we knew the firepower we had and I think we made good acquisitions last summer. If you look at the price we paid for George Hirst, that’s good asset value in this market. I think we were effective in what we did.
"As a result of that, we’ll now have more firepower to go again in January and we’ll have more firepower to go again next summer.
“That said, January is always a difficult transfer window. It’s a seller’s window, not a buyer’s window. But we’ll be prepared going into it."
Asked how close the club is to Financial Fair Play limits, Ashton explained: “We’ve got headroom. We know in detail what that headroom looks like.
"This is where our incredible fans help. They have just been fantastic with buying tickets and shirts and the more money we draw into the football club through revenue gives us the ability to spend more on players."
Ipswich, as Ashton outlined, signed Championship-ready players as a League One club last January. Will they try and sign Premier League-ready players as a Championship club this time around?
“We recruit the best players we possibly can in every single window," replied the Blues chief.
"Kieran has his technical and physical specifications. We try and get the balance right with players who have got more experience and players who are young, hungry and who he can develop. That won’t change.
“He’s very clear with me on where he wants to add to the squad in January, but he also talks about the balance of his squad all the time.
"We’re at a full 25-man squad at the moment, so someone has got to come out of that squad for someone to go in. That’s where Kieran is so good. He’s very calm, he’s very considered, he looks at the balance of the whole squad before he makes his decision. He really does his homework.
“When we recruited Kieran one of the first things I was keen to learn about when I met him was his values. He’s clearly got high football IQ, but he’s also got high EQ – and that’s emotional intelligence around the players and the staff.
“That balance of his players will be absolutely key to him as we step through each transfer window."
He added: "People always talk to me about how clubs who have got money are naturally successful. Let me tell you, having been a CEO at clubs who have had no money and been a CEO at clubs who have had financial support, trust me, it’s more difficult at the latter because you’ve got to spend that money wisely. That's what we'll look to do."
EADT and Ipswich Star subscribers can exclusively watch the whole of Stuart Watson's interview with Town CEO Mark Ashton here. Our current 50% off flash sale gives you the chance to sign up for £2.99 a month for six months.
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