SAINTS head coach George Burley could not disguise the affection he still has for Ipswich Town even after seeing his new club soundly beaten and revealed he could soon be playing in the famous old blues strip once more.

By Derek Davis

SAINTS head coach George Burley could not disguise the affection he still has for Ipswich Town even after seeing his new club soundly beaten and revealed he could soon be playing in the famous old blues strip once more.

After seeing his side lose 2-0, Burley paid tribute to the Blues, and their players old and new.

He said: “Ipswich have improved in the last month ad the team is beginning to come together.

“They have been lacking goals but Joe has brought in Alan Lee and he was outstanding with his two goals.

“Richard Naylor was tremendous at the back. He has always been a 100 percenter and he and Jason De Vos were outstanding.

“Richard has asked me to come and play in a veterans game as part of his testimonial and that would be great.

“I always look out for my old players, they are all smashing lads and a lot are doing very well. There are five at Charlton.

“I was impressed with the new young players against us. Young players coming through are the lifeblood of the club and it is good to see they are still doing well, as indeed we have good youngsters coming through at Southampton.”

Burley did not disagree with Jim Magilton's assertion in Saturday's EADT, that Fabian Wilnis was probably his best value for money buy after paying just over £200,000 for the Dutchman.

He said: “Fabian has done tremendously well for Ipswich. I can remember going over to Holland with Romeo Zondervan to watch him and I have liked him from day one. He is another who has been a terrific servant to Ipswich Town, as indeed is Jim Magilton. It is good to see them still doing very well for the club.”

Burley refused to look for any excuses after his new club were beaten by his old club.

He was asked if he felt Jimmy Juan should have been sent off for a tackle on Dexter Blackstock and if the off-field demonstrations had been detrimental to the result as Saints had to operate to the backdrop of a prolonged protest against chairman Rupert Lowe.

A 'Lowe Out' banner unfurled at half-time and Saints supporters adapted the rugby hymn Sweet Chariot to 'Swing low, sweet Rupert Lowe, swinging off the Itchen Bridge'

And when the chant 'stand up if you want Lowe out' was sung, the vast majority of the 20,000 Saints fans stood up.

But Burley refused to allow those to be used in mitigation.

He said: “When things are not going well, and it has been a frustrating time over the last couple of seasons, then you lose one of the best young players in the country through no fault of the chairman, then fans will get frustrated and want to express that.

The most important thing now is that we all have to stick together. As manager I have full support for the chairman and we all have to work hard to change things.

“That doesn't help but we are not looking to that as an excuse. We were not good enough it was as simple as that.

“Ipswich deserved the three points and we did not deserve to get anything from the game. We were just not good enough and it showed we have to improve.”