A UNIQUE white shirt will be worn by Ipswich Town for their game at Crystal Palace later this month.The London club's home kit of dark red and blues stripes clashes with both Town's first choice blues strip and their usual wine-coloured away kit.

A UNIQUE white shirt will be worn by Ipswich Town for their game at Crystal Palace later this month, writes Derek Davis.

The London club's home kit of dark red and blues stripes clashes with both Town's first choice blues strip and their usual wine-coloured away kit.

The one-off shirt is a reverse of the Powergen top introduced at the beginning of the season, but unlike previous years when single-use shirts were introduced, 2,000 replicas will be made available.

The shirt was unveiled yesterday and modelled by Matt Bloomfield at the club's launch of its community department's Big Fun Football scheme.

Bloomfield, who made his first-team debut against Notts County last month, joined in as coaches demonstrated activities such as Target Wall, Basketball Football and Crab Alley.

Aimed at five to 12-year-olds the courses are held at venues across East Anglia, including Mildenhall, Felixstowe, Woodbridge, Thurston, Newmarket and Harlow, and Bloomfield can remember joining in as a seven-year-old.

He said: “It was brilliant. I met David Lowe who was in the first team at the time and had a great time.

“My mum and dad brought me down, probably to stop winding up my brothers and sisters and it was excellent.

“We were playing games and getting coaching at an early age in a safe and controlled environment. Back then you dream of playing for England and for Ipswich but you never really believe it will happen. Yet years later here I am having done both, all from that first course.

“Playing for England under-19s at Portman Road and making my Ipswich Town debut at Notts County are the two best things that have ever happened to me so far.”