Ipswich Town boss Kieran McKenna took plenty of positives from his side’s training game at Arsenal this afternoon.

The Blues lost the match 5-1 at the Gunners’ training ground, with Sone Aluko on target for McKenna’s side on an afternoon where Eddie Nketiah netted a hat-trick for the hosts. Sambi Lokonga and Folarin Balogun scored the other two goals.

McKenna changed his entire XI at the break, with Wes Burns featuring for the first-team during pre-season after returning from international duty with Wales, and the boss was happy with what he saw.

“It was a good exercise to finish the week off,” McKenna said after the game. “We’ve had a really hard training week so they’ve tired a bit at the latter end of the day.

“Physically it was a really demanding game because when you play training games at training grounds the ball’s always in play. It comes back in straight away.

“To get 45 minutes into the 22 players was really good. It was a good way to finish off the week and sets up well for next week.

“I thought we put some good things together in the first half where we just needed to be a little bit sharper. In the second half we probably should have scored two or three goals but there was some good play.

“There’s lots to improve on as well, lots of things to improve on the ball and certainly defensively at times.

“But it’s a training exercise for us so we’re trying out a few different things and playing people in different positions to have a look at them and look at new relationships.

“We know it’s not all going to be perfectly smooth over the next couple of weeks and we don’t really want it to be. We want to iron out some things now and give ourselves some different solutions.”

Arsenal played a number of senior players during the training match, including Ben White, Hector Bellerin, Nicolas Pepe and former Ipswich loanee Ainsley Maitland-Niles. Former Ipswich youngster Marcelo Flores was part of a younger side in the second half.

McKenna said: “Arsenal in the first half was a really, really, really strong team, so that was a good experience for the players to go up against that. Physically the challenge was really good. Technically and tactically it’s a good challenge.

“For us, just as a little marker of where we’re at two weeks in, I think it was a really good day.”

George Edmundson, Kayden Jackson and Tyreece John-Jules were not involved, with the latter joining on loan from Arsenal recently.

Town head for a pre-season camp at Loughborough University next week, with their next pre-season game coming against West Ham in July 12.

Arsenal first half: Leno, Bellerin, White, Mari, Cedric, Partey, Maitland-Niles, Lokonga, Pepe, Nketiah, Nelson.

Arsenal second half: Okonkwo, Walters, Kirk, Awe, Sousa, Smith, Oulad-M'Hand, Patino, Hutchinson, Balogun, Flores.

Ipswich Town first half: Walton, Donacien, Ball, Ndaba, Vincent-Young, Harper, Morsy, Penney, Chaplin, Hughes (Armin), Ladapo.

Ipswich Town second half: Hladky, Woolfenden, Burgess, Leigh, Burns, El Mizouni, Evans, Humphreys (Armin), Edwards, Aluko, Pigott.