Ipswich Town midfielder Lee Evans has left the club after reaching an agreement to terminate his contract.

The 29-year-old midfielder has made 61 appearances for the Blues since joining on a free transfer from Wigan and was a key man during the early stages of Kieran McKenna's management.

His suffered repeated knee injuries from February 2022 onwards though and eventually underwent surgery to rectify the issue in October last year.

Ipswich needed to cut a player from their squad to stay within the 25-man senior limit following the deadline day addition of striker Kieffer Moore.

Evans was due to be out of contract this summer. Town reached a similar agreement with winger Kyle Edwards, who has since signed for Oxford United, earlier this month.

"Lee Evans has progressed really well with his injury, but is still probably a month or so away from being fit," said McKenna.

"Following discussions with the club, both parties agreed it's going to be so important for him to get games in the second part of the season if possible.

"He's a terrific player, terrific professional, has missed a lot of games through injury. We hope now that the issue is fully resolved because he's had the surgery.

"But it's really important for him to get back playing games again now. He's hopefully going to be fit for the last few months of the season and with the depth that we have in those positions it was unlikely that he was going to get the game time here.

"Lee came to an agreement with the club. He'll of course continue his rehabilitation here, do his last month of work until he's back full training and then he'll have the opportunity to go and try and sign somewhere as a free agent.

"Hopefully he'll get quite a few games before the end of the season. Whoever takes him will be getting a very, very good football player, a fantastic character and someone who is hopefully now set up for some really good years ahead."

Reflecting on Evans' role in the early stage of Town's promotion season, McKenna said: "If you look at Lee's form in the period after I first arrived and the progression of the other players who are still here, Samy Morsy, Conor Chaplin, Wes Burns, I think there's every chance that Lee, injury free would have made those same type of jumps. He's been very unfortunate."