WHEN it comes to a dream return to a former club, things could not have gone much better for Watford keeper Scott Loach.The 20-year-old who was with the Blues academy as a boy put in a star performance to keep a clean sheet against his favourite club, and opposite his boyhood hero in Richard Wright.

Derek Davis

By Derek Davis

WHEN it comes to a dream return to a former club, things could not have gone much better for Watford keeper Scott Loach.

The 20-year-old who was with the Blues academy as a boy put in a star performance to keep a clean sheet against his favourite club, and opposite his boyhood hero in Richard Wright.

Loach said: “I'm an Ipswich fan and always will be, but I still wanted to beat them.

“Richard Wright was my hero - I always looked up to him - when I was in the Ipswich academy from the age of seven to about 12.

“I was just a young lad when he was the next big thing and going off to join Arsenal.

“It was great to play against him and a privilege just to be on the same pitch as him.

“It was also great to play in front of the fans I used to come here and sit amongst to watch the games.”

Since leaving Ipswich with his family as a 12-year-old to live back in the Nottingham area, Loach has made a �50,000 move from Lincoln City, where Gareth McAuley was a club-mate, and won England under 21 recognition.

But he has never lost his love for the Portman Road club.

He said: “I left the academy for family reasons when we left Ipswich to go back north but I will never stop being an Ipswich fan, regardless of where I live. You support the team you grew up with and I will always keep an eye out for Ipswich.

“It would be nice to think Ipswich would have taken me on but I'll never know. I finished my last academy year with Nottingham Forest but I wasn't taken on there.

“It was great to play on such a beautiful pitch. It must be everybody's dream to play on a pitch like that. If you can't play out there you might as well hang your boots up, to be honest. The conditions were perfect.”

He showed Town fans what they were missing out on with a string of vital saves; although his manager Brendan Rodgers said his kicking could have been better such are his standards.

Loach said: “Hopefully I showed what I can do. My best save was the late one from Alan Quinn and the rest of the time it was just a case of making blocks and making sure I kept the ball out.

“The gaffer has really got us going.

“People still label us long-ball but we are playing a lot of good football, even if you have to mix it up a bit in the Championship. I don't think this league gets the respect it deserves.

“We'll take anything - one point or three - at the moment. We're on a decent run and hopefully we will be safe sooner rather than later.”

Loach has one England Under-21 cap and is in the squad for the friendlies against Norway and France.

He added: “Some players will have next weekend off but I would rather have 10 days with England than a few days off any time of the year.”

Derek.davis@eadt.co.uk